


Our Stars are the Same

by beforethedawn, ConstructFairytales, Destinyawakened



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe, Anal Sex, Best Friends, Blow Jobs, Bullies, Character Deaths, Eventual Smut, F/M, Love Letters, M/M, Reunions, Sexual Tension, Sleep Walking, Starts as a kid fic turns into adult fic, jealous!Will, kiddie snuggles, mention of suicide, nothing sexual under age, penpals, soul mates, we're not crying you're crying, will's temper, winston as a puppy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-14
Updated: 2016-08-24
Packaged: 2018-07-24 00:46:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 42,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7486773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beforethedawn/pseuds/beforethedawn, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ConstructFairytales/pseuds/ConstructFairytales, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Destinyawakened/pseuds/Destinyawakened
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Someone's moved into the old creepy, supposedly haunted, mansion down the way from Will Graham and his family. Will never expects to befriend the new family's son.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Grahams meet the Lecters

**Author's Note:**

> 1) Edited and Beta'd by us, so no one else was involved.  
> 2) We hope you like our little Graham family AU and our take on a few things!  
> 3) Little graphic made by Destiny as we imagined Will's Parents and Hannibal's, mischa included, and of course the boys. ;)

 

“Mischa?” a boy’s voice called out, over the hill that kept the Graham residence from the sprawling acres of the oldest, most haunted mansion in New Orleans.

The mansion had been abandoned for years, no one around was rich enough, or brave enough to even think about moving in with it’s ghosts.

That seemed, however, to have changed recently.  
  
A well-dressed little blonde girl, no more than three years old, ran down the hill, giggling. She hid behind the wide trunk of a willow tree, near a window of the small house. She was cheerfully oblivious to the fact that this was no longer her yard, and was certainly not her house.   
  
“Mischa!” the unseen boy called out again, a note of concern in his voice.   
  
The little girl stayed hidden, laughing to herself as she patted the fuzzy top of a dandelion that grew near her foot, like it was an animal.

Barking grew louder from the house at the end of the hill, a quaint little cottage of sorts, with a white porch railing and matching shutters. A dark haired woman, clad in red and black flannel opened the rickety porch door and two dogs ran out quickly, mutts of unknown variety, up toward the girl only they could hear in the distance.  A boy ran out next, in jeans and blue and green plaid, dark curls in his face as he raced off after his pets.

“Not that way!” He called after them, running faster up the hill to catch up.

“C’mon, that's to the old creepy house,” he groaned, though the two dogs hardly cared once they found the little girl and were sniffing her all over.

“Will! Make sure you're home by dinner!” He could hear his mother calling after him, and he waved her off.

The little girl’s eyes went wide at the strange dogs sniffing her, but within seconds, she was petting them with both hands, murmuring to them in a different language than they’d likely heard before, and tucked her dandelion into the larger dog’s collar.  
  
“Mischa!” boy on the other side of the hill called, clearly irritated now as he followed the little girl’s meandering footsteps to the crest of the hill. His dark eyes went wide when he saw the tree with large dogs huddled around it, and Mischa’s leg, and he set off toward it, sprinting as quickly as his short legs would carry him.   
  
Will got there first, and tugged the two dogs back. They let him, obviously used to listening to him until a little, giggling girl was present who smelled like _treats_ and other new things.

“Sorry,” Will murmured, getting both dogs by the collars, which was much harder than it looked, his lithe limbs struggling to hold them. “They really like kids.” 

The dark-eyed boy reached the tree, and scooped Mischa up, looking her over with worry before he looked at the dogs, and then Will, as though he hadn’t been aware he was there until just now.  
  
“They’re very large,” the boy with dark eyes said, with what sounded almost like a Russian accent, as he set the girl down, and kept her just behind him, holding onto her with one hand. The boy was sandy-haired, boyishly handsome, and taller than Will, perhaps a year older. He was impeccably clean, and as well dressed as the little girl who was trying to reach the dogs again with a smile from behind the boy’s legs. “ _Mischa_ , ne,” he said, sternly, without taking his dark eyes off of the dogs, or Will.

“They're friendly,” Will said, pushing up his glasses, over his big, doe like, blue eyes. “This is Jyn and Ben.” He introduced them like family. “They just wanna play.”

The taller boy looked at the dogs, warily, then at Will. The dogs were behaving now, at least.  
“This is Mischa, my sister. I’m sorry she disturbed you, she likes to run off,” the boy said with a look back at his little sister, who was still fascinated with the dogs. “My name is Hannibal,” he added, politely, and waited for the boy with glasses to introduce himself, as he offered his hand.

Will wiped his own hand on his shirt, not wanting to ruin Hannibal’s well put together ensemble, or his well groomed look. “Will Graham. I live just down the hill with my parents.” He nodded over his shoulder, floppy curls falling into his eyes, over his glasses.

The dogs wagged and waited for Will to let them play again, which he did, and they sniffed all around Mischa’s feet and then at Hannibal’s.Hannibal watched the dogs, and Mischa as she giggled again and wriggled her little hand out of Hannibal’s to crouch down and play with the big dogs, babbling at them in Lithuanian. Mischa’s protective older brother observed them, regally, then looked back at Will as he let go of Will’s hand.

“We’ve just moved into the manor, that way, from Lithuania. Mother wanted Mischa out of the way of the workers, so here we are. Mischa is never really out of the way of much for too long, as you can see,” he said with a look at his sister, and a shake of his head. The serious boy smiled a little, however, obviously very fond of his sister, no matter how spirited she could be.  
“Do you have a sister? A brother?” Hannibal asked Will, staring a little at the bouncy wildness of his hair, and how large Will’s eyes seemed behind his glasses.

Will shook his head, keeping his eyes down, mostly on Hannibal’s hands or feet, his ear if he had to look at him at all. He was very regal and mostly out of place, at least to Will. “No. Just my mom and dad, and the dogs.”

Hannibal looked down the hill, at the house, and marveled that three people lived in it, but knew to say that would be rude. “I’ve never been to America before,” Hannibal said, as Mischa rolled around with the dogs in the long grass. “Is it rude to look at someone’s eyes here?” he asked, candidly, more curious than actually ignorant about customs.  
  
“What?” Will blinked and looked at Hannibal, catching his eye for the first time, and then looked away, biting his lip with awkwardly large front teeth, bigger than most of the others. “Oh, no, uh,.. Sorry.” His parents said it was _rude_ , but when Will looked at someone to really _see_ them, eyes were the hardest part.

He often felt too much.

“I get headaches is all.”

Hannibal’s eyes were large and full of questions, he had a mind that was insatiably hungry for answers and information, sharper than most his age, to put it mildly. Right now, he was rather _fascinated_ with the boy in front of him, his messy hair, and strange habits. “Looking at eyes makes your head hurt?” Hannibal asked, with a tilt of his head and stepped closer.   
  
The regal boy looked very put together, but was missing one tooth. A black gap showed where a sharp canine incisor would grow in, soon. He looked rather like a leggy cub of some sort of large cat, already graceful and poised, but hardly a deadly hunter. He approached Will slowly, like he was stalking him through long grass, curious.   
  
“Yeah,” Will replied, not sure how else to explain it to Hannibal. It wasn’t even something many doctors could explain, and his parents stopped trying altogether. Will was unique, that’s what they told him, but that uniqueness often landed him in the ‘special needs’ classes and away from the regulars class rooms.

Will moved hair from his eyes, but it did little help, having taken on his mother’s hair type, wild and curly. Taking a step back, he watched Hannibal’s nicely polished shoes in the grass at their feet as Mischa giggled and laughed as the dogs played fetched every time she threw their stick.

Hannibal stepped closer to the other boy, looking at him with great curiosity. “People make you stressed, and the stress gives you a headache?” Hannibal guessed. “My father gets headaches from stress, he has to retire to his study for hours, sometimes.”

Did kids get stressed out? Will wondered, and realized that people did stress him out, but that was because he could see them, _really_ see them if he looked too hard. His imagination went haywire, and he saw things he never wanted to see again, too often.

“Somethin’ like that,” Will murmured quietly, “Mama wants to home school me.”

“We are home schooled,” Hannibal said, looking back at Mischa again. She was thoroughly dirty now, and Hannibal knew they’d have to find a new dress for her at home. He might as well let her tire herself out running around with the gentle dogs. “There’s nothing wrong with it,” Hannibal added, with a little shrug of his thin shoulders. “But, you say it like it’s a bad thing. Why? Do you like school?” Hannibal sat on a fallen log, leaving space next to him for Will. He couldn’t remember the last time he spoke to another child for this long, besides Mischa.

Clasping his hands together, Will sat down, but stayed far enough away from Hannibal so that he didn’t invade his space at all, or get him dirty on accident. Hannibal was almost like a statue, clean and perfect. Will shrugged right back.

“I like school. I don’t like the kids. They, uh, don’t like me.” Will liked people just fine, in fact he found he really liked helping out, but it always came with a cost: stressed out dreams a night or two later.

“ _Most_ children don’t like anyone different,” Hannibal said, with a brotherly tone, and leaned closer to Will, lowering his voice. “Because most children are _stupid_.”

Will was the kind to befriend anyone, shy or not, he had a knack for coercing people to him, probably because he was mostly kind, and mostly wanted to help. “They aren’t stupid, they’re just kids.”

Will and Hannibal both sounded much too old for their ages. Will had seen too much in his short years, mostly from his overactive imagination and the ability to get right down the nitty gritty inside the minds of people around him.

“Alright, some of them are stupid, some are just immature and _rude_ ,” Hannibal sighed, as though that was the worst thing he could think to call a person, then looked at Will again.

“Not you, of course,” Hannibal added, quickly, and went very slightly pink across the tops of his round cheeks, then looked away.

Will made a face, scrunching up his nose as his glass then fell down the ridge, and he sighed. “I’m not rude?” Many teachers would think otherwise, and never said it to his face, but he overheard them now and then, when they thought he couldn’t hear them, or acted as though he couldn’t understand them.

Being ‘special’ wasn’t very special at all.

“You haven’t been rude to me,” Hannibal said with a spread of his hands, and a little smile, then moved just a little close to Will. “What do you like to do here? We only arrived yesterday in New York, and here this morning.”

“I got a boat,” Will said, and though they lived near the bayou, there was a smaller pond not far. “Go fishin’ sometimes with my dad, but he’s gotta work lots. Do you fish?” Will’s blue eyes brightened up, hopeful.   
  
“I’ve never fished,” Hannibal admitted, and looked over at the bayou, curiously. “But, I wouldn’t mind learning, of course. Mother says that it’s always important to try new things.”   
  
“I’m just learning, but I’ve caught a few. We don’t keep ‘em from the bayou though. Dad goes out to big river for the fish,” Will explained, excited all at once to have a friend that might just want to do something with him, not shun him aside.

“I really should ask my parents, first, before going somewhere else, especially with Mischa,” Hannibal said, with a heavy sigh of responsibility. He looked at Mischa, who was picking little flowers and putting them on the dogs heads, like crowns. “I’d like to learn, and to see the land a little more. Do you ride?”

“Ride?” Will asked, head canted, his curls flopping to one side as he did. “Horses, you mean? I’ve never had a horse.”

“Oh,” Hannibal said, surprised, and nodded up toward his new home, “we’re having some brought to the stables today. You can come meet them, if you like.”

“Like, a real horse?” Will asked, brows shifting up into his hairline, under the layers of curls. “I gotta ask my mama. When will they get here? Dinner is in a few hours. ..”

“Likely after dinner,” Hannibal said, and looked toward Will’s house again at the mention of his mother.

“And yes, real horses. We had more back home but they don’t travel overseas very well.”

“I'll ask her at dinner then. Are they nice?  Horses?” Will had heard stories how some people got kicked off and beat by horses. He hoped his mama hadn't heard those ones.

Hannibal chuckled at Will’s enthusiasm, and smiled at him, showing off the little gap in his teeth. “They’re all well trained, I could show you how to be safe around them.”

“I'd like that,” Will said, pushing his glasses up his nose and looked at Hannibal, however indirectly. “ My mama might want to come, she's kinda weird like that.”

“I’m sure my Mother would be happy to meet one of the neighbours,” Hannibal said, with a little smile when their eyes met. “I’ll ask over dinner and come back, without Mischa this time.”

Mischa looked up at her big brother with a frown, and he smiled at her, joking. “Hannibal!” she chided, and brought some flowers to him, then decided to decorate him, as punishment.

“She’s alright,” Will said, feeling more attuned to her than most other children, but Mischa was young yet, and they _could_ relate on that level of empathy. At least for now. He turned his gaze back to Hannibal, licking his bottom lip. “She’s spunky.”

Hannibal tolerated Mischa’s decoration of him, and just smiled at her, laughing, “she’s very whimsical.” Hannibal tickled Mischa while she shoved wildflowers in his hair, giggling.

Will smiled at her and then picked a bunch of clovers and covered her in them. “Like a fairy princess?”

Mischa nodded with a big smile at Will. “So pretty!” she whispered, and Hannibal sighed at her.

“Are you finished yet?” Hannibal asked his sister, who shook her head and hopped off the log to find more flowers.

“Do you have to go?” Will asked, urgently, all the sudden, eyes big as he looked over at the other boy. He’d finally met a child near his age that didn’t find him weird, and didn’t give him horrible emotions.

“No,” Hannibal said, with a little smile at Will as he pulled flowers out of his thick, straight hair, and set them aside as Mischa protested. “I just wanted her to stop putting her flowers on me,” he said, looking at Will. “Is your boat here?”

“It’s docked at the house. It’s just a little rowboat,” Will explained, getting to his feet. “I can show you…”

“Please,” Hannibal nodded, and stood, then held his hand out for Mischa to take. “Mischa, shall we see Will’s boat?” he asked, working on her English by trying to speak it with her all the time.

“Boat?” she asked, curious, but took Hannibal’s hand, and Will’s too.

Will let her, finding it quite cute, he’d never been around many younger kids. He squeezed her hand gently, and then smiled. Will lead them both down to their house, toward the back where a little boat sat, upside down, on stilts to keep out critters.

“A boat. Dad has a bigger one.”

Mischa stared at it, and then let go, running toward it to stand under it, laughing, “This my house!!!”

Hannibal sighed, and looked at Will as he walked to it. “Is it alright that she does that? I’m sorry, she’s very impulsive,” Hannibal said, under his voice as Mischa played.

“It’s fine,” Will said, shrugging small shoulders as he watched Mischa enjoy herself, in ways he had never seen in other kids. She had imagination, something he felt very akin to. He crawled in under with her, taller, and laughed as his voice echoed through the hull.

Mischa laughed at the echo and clapped her hands, then started to sing so that she could hear her own voice echo. She sang a little song in a foreign language, and Hannibal applauded at the end, joining the other two in the makeshift auditorium of an upside down rowboat. He sat close to Will under the boat, their shoulders almost touching. “Brava,” he said, and Mischa made an elaborate bow that made him laugh.The dogs also burrowed their way under the small boat, and started to howl like it was game, echoing long after the little girl had sung her little song. Will couldn’t stop laughing, and the noise garnered more attention from the house than anything. The back porch door creaked open and slammed as the springs wound up and then let go.

“Will?”

Booted feet stopped at the boat, and Will saw his mother’s green eyes peering in at them, a smile gracing her face when she realized Will had made friends. Will pushed long strands of dark curls out of his face.

“Are these our new neighbors?” she drawled, squatting down to get a better view of the new boy and the little girl, who was being licked by Jyn.

“Yeah,” Will said, touching the other boy’s arm. “Hannibal, and his sister, Mischa. They’re from… Lithuania.”

Mischa crawled out from under the boat, and smiled at Mrs. Graham, and Hannibal looked a little embarrassed, like he was rarely caught doing something so silly, and crawled out to stand properly, and offer his hand. “Hannibal Lecter, this is my sister, Mischa-”  
  
Mischa was already hugging Mrs. Graham’s legs.   
  
Will crawled out after them, dirt on his hands and knees, but his mother hardly seemed to care. She patted the little girls’ hair gently, smiling down at her and then shook the young boy’s hand.   
  
“Charlotte Graham,” she said, her southern drawl working around the words with her sugary sweet tone.

Will leaned in toward Hannibal, “You can call her Miss Charlotte,” he whispered.

Hannibal looked a little perplexed by that custom, but he nodded. “It’s nice to meet you, Miss Charlotte,” he said, politely, and looked at Will, then back at his mother. It was easy to see where Will got his hair from. “I still have to ask my parents, but might it be alright if Will came to my house after dinner? We have horses coming today to our stables, you are welcome to come, Miss Charlotte.”

Will looked particularly hopeful, his hands clasped behind his back, grinding his boot into the dirt as his mother seemed to consider with a careful, thoughtful bite to her bottom lip.

“Well, I suppose it might be alright. Your father won’t be home until much later,” she said, addressing her son, and then looked at Hannibal. “But please ask your folks first, alright?”

“Of course,” Hannibal nodded, and looked back at Will with a little smile, charmed by how eager Will was to come see the horses. It was nice to meet someone … unusual. America did not feel quite as insufferable as Hannibal thought it might. “You have a lovely place, Miss Charlotte,” he complimented, politely, and then spoke a few words of quiet Lithuanian to his sister, to keep her from trying to get Charlotte to pick her up. “I apologize for Mischa,” he sighed, used to saying that by now.  
  
“She’s fine, darlin’,”Charlotte said and patted the girl’s head again. “Do you and your folks maybe wanna come over for dinner? We’re have catfish stew.”   
  
Hannibal’s eyebrows went up at the thought, not even sure what that was. “If you’d like, I can ask,” he said, intrigued.   
  
“Sure, hon, you just let me know. There’s plenty to go around,” Charlotte said, and ruffled Will’s hair. “Go on and play now. There’s time.”

Will knew his mother was happy to see he had made a friend, let alone of their new neighbors, no matter how strange they might seem to be. Knowing how his mother was around people, like Will, he also knew she was sacrificing a bit for Will.

Hannibal took Mischa’s hand and whispered to her, and she waved at Charlotte.  
  
“Goodbye Miss!” she said with a big, cheery smile, then toddled back to play with Jyn again, who brought the stick.   
  
“Would you like to come back to the house to ask my parents if they’ll come for dinner?” Hannibal offered Will, strangely reluctant to leave his new company. Usually, he couldn’t wait to get rid of other children, and do something more interesting.   
  
“Your parents?” Will asked, gulping a little. Adults were harder to be around, it was easy with his parents, he knew them, but new people? Will knew he’d need to meet them at some point though. “Okay.”

“No need to be nervous, they’re busy arranging the house,” Hannibal explained to Will, and led him back up the hill, with Mischa in tow by the hand.

Will kept his hands in his pockets, keeping up with Hannibal, but an eye on Mischa, the dogs following suit after them, panting and wagging, happily.

“What is a crawfish?” Hannibal asked as they reached the top of the hill, which overlooked the stately and gothic mansion in the distance. Workers unloaded trucks with large furniture, moving it all carefully into the house.

“Crawfish?” Will asked, pronouncing it far different than Hannibal. “They're like little tiny lobsters.” He made a size with his fingers, maybe three inches, but  it depended on the size of the critter too.

Hannibal looked fascinated, unaware that such a creature existed.

“Where does one find them? The ocean?” he asked, as Mischa skipped along at his side.

“The swamps and the rivers,” Will replied, gesturing back toward the swamps behind them. “Maybe not those.”

Hannibal smiled at the dark, mysterious looking swamp, and looked at Will the same way. “Do you go in there often?”

“Nah, there’s alligators in there, and mama won’t let me go alone,” Will said, but there was a sense of danger behind his eyes, as though he’s thought about it.

“Alligators?” Hannibal asked, with a spark of interest in his tone. “I’ve never seen one. Are they very large?”

“They can be,” Will said, as they walked down to the gothic looking old plantation home. “People catch them here, and down in the city, in New Orleans, you can get Alligator on a stick. It’s real good, I had it once.”

Hannibal’s eyes went wide for a moment and he reached over to touch Will’s arm. “We _must_ do that someday,” he said, with a serious nod, “I’ll buy one for both of us if you show me where they are.”   
  
“The alligators on a stick, or the alligators themselves?” Will asked,  interest piqued as he had a feeling just being around Hannibal that he liked the extreme and unusual.   
  
A slow, sort of playful smile grew on Hannibal’s face, wide enough to show off his missing tooth as the wind blew his straight, ashy hair into his eyes. “Perhaps both would be fun … at the same time.”   
  
“Eating alligators while… watching them?” Will’s eyes grew wide, knowing he’d have to find a way to do this, as it _did_ sound fun. “Mischa will have to stay at home for that.”

“Of course she would,” Hannibal agreed, and his cheeks flushed a little with pleasure at the thought of doing something so forbidden with a friend who liked the same thing. “That’s alright.”  
  
Will got into a lot of things when his parents sent him out to play, things he never told anyone about. He stole pumpkins one year from the farm down the way, and once took the beaten dog from the neighbor a mile down the road. The Neighbor never noticed, but the dog died before he could get his parents to help.

“Okay then,” Will said, quietly, approaching the house now, closer, it was much larger than he realized. “Wow.”

“It’s very different from our home in Lithuania, but I like it,” Hannibal said, lightly, his hand still against Will’s arm.

“It’s interesting.”  
  
Will watched the house with big eyes, and rubbed them under the frames there, and then looked at Hannibal. “Is it haunted?”

Hannibal looked back at the house, then at Will, hopefully.  “Is it? I’ve barely been in it at all.”

“That’s the story,” Will said, quietly, but he wasn’t so sure he believed in ghosts or not, but either way he was hesitant to go in.

Hannibal smiled at that, delighted. “I like the idea, but I don’t think we’re going to see any ghosts,” he said, almost disappointed at the thought.

“You first then,” Will said, quietly,  sliding in behind Hannibal before they shuffled into the house.

Hannibal smiled back at Will and touched his arm again, fondly.

“Don’t worry, I won’t let them get you,” he promised with a little grin, then crouched to brush off Mischa’s dress for her, and stepped through the entrance when what looked like a butler opened the heavy, carved oak door.  
  
The house was clean, from top to bottom, but looked decidedly dark in mood. It had high, arched ceilings and a grand staircase that faced the front door, upon which workmen were busy installing a thick, deep green carpet.   
  
Other workmen were busy assembling things such as a grandfather clock against one wall, and a china cabinet against another.   
  
A very tall man pulled a sword from a wooden crate, and examined the blade in the light. Hannibal walked up behind him.   
  
“Father,” he said, and Mischa hugged his legs from behind.   
  
“Papa!”   
  
Will stood there, watching the man with the sword, eyes big and bright, nervously wringing his hands together behind his back. New people were always so hard gauge at first, and even harder to know when not to… reach out.

The stately man with cheekbones that looked like they’d been carved by a sculptor looked down at his daughter with a little smile, and said something in Lithuanian that made her giggle, then looked at Hannibal, and Will … puzzled.

“This is my friend, Will. He lives with his family in the house nearest the water just that way,” Hannibal said, gesturing to the window.   
  
Count Lecter blinked, looking from Will to Hannibal for a moment, then set the sword down, and offered his hand to Will.   
  
“Nice to meet you, Will. Good to see Hannibal has found a friend already,” he said, in a deep voice. His eyes were an almost wolfish shade of blue.

Swallowing down his fear, Will took Hannibal’s father’s hand and shook it politely, as his parents would have taught him to do. “Very nice to meet you, sir.”

“Will’s mother has invited us to their house for dinner tonight,” Hannibal said, hopefully to his father, with a little smile at him, and stood closer to Will, shoulder to shoulder.

Hannibal’s father looked much more surprised at that than he did at the dinner invitation.  
  
“That’s very kind, you’ll have to ask your mother, she arranges our social events, but thank you,” the Count said to Will, with a nod. In the meantime, Mischa went to the door and brought Jyn and Ben inside.   
  
“Dogs!!!” she announced.

Will’s eyes went wide and he went to grab the dogs by the collars, to get them back out. “Sorry!” he exclaimed. “I’ll put them out.” He did smile at Mischa though, not wanting her to feel bad about it, but he didn’t need his dogs running all over the large mansion either.

“No, no, no,” the count said, with a wave of his hand. “Let them stay. Are these hunting dogs?” he asked crouching down to look at them more closely.  
  
Hannibal smirked a little, like he knew this was going to happen.

“No, just dogs. Ben and Jyn,” Will introduced the dogs who seemed to understand, and sat there, both giving one paw to the tall man in greeting. Well trained, as Will and his father had done when they got them.

The Count chuckled, and shook their paws, admiring them.

“Richardas, why are there animals in the foyer?” a female voice with an Italian accent asked with a sigh from the stairs. An elegantly dressed woman with dark blonde hair approached, her outfit impeccably assembled to the last accessory, even if she was only at home.  
  
“These are my friend Will’s dogs,” Hannibal explained to his mother, turning to face her, then introduced Will, proudly. “Mama, this is Will. Will, this is my Mother.”   
  
The elegant, blonde woman looked genuinely stunned for a moment, then recovered smoothly, and offered Will her hand. “Will, so lovely to meet you.”   
  
Will shook her hand just as he had Will’s father. “Ma’am,” he said with a little nod. “I’ll put the dogs out if you want…” He didn’t need them getting her pretty outfit all ruined.

“No, no, my apologies. They’re visitors, that would be rude,” she said, tolerantly, as Hannibal’s father wrestled them a little, playfully, and then stood next to his wife again, with more composure.

“Will’s mother has extended an invitation to our family for dinner tonight,” Richardas told his wife, looking at how close Will and Hannibal were standing as though they’d never had Hannibal make a friend voluntarily before.  
  
Will wasn’t sure if most families were like this or not, as he’d never been to a friend’s house before, never met their family, and nor he have a friend anyway. Hannibal was a first for him in a lot of ways. “We’re having catfish stew, it’s real good,” Will said, though biased of his mother’s cooking, he did enjoy the stew immensely, it was probably one of his favorite dishes.   
  
Hannibal looked hopefully at his mother, who exchanged an understanding look with him, as though they could nearly read one another’s minds, and then nodded. “That would be lovely, we’re still settling in, the kitchen is not ready to use for the evening. Please tell your mother we’d be happy to enjoy her hospitality,” Hannibal’s mother said to Will, with a warm smile, charmed by the little boy and his shaggy hair, and the effect he seemed to have on Hannibal.

Will smiled brightly, all slightly crooked teeth and then tugged on Hannibal’s hand. “I’ll go tell my mama so she can make extra cornbread.”

Mischa reached her arms up to her mother, sleepy, and Hannibal’s mother picked her up gracefully, then nodded at Will. “Call, and let us know what time we are expected. I think Mischa is ready for an afternoon rest,” she said as she looked at Mischa, then back at Hannibal. “Hannibal, you must return before dinner to dress, please.”

  
“Si, Mama,” he nodded, but was already tugging Will toward the door to go outside again, which seemed to please his father.

“Nice to meet you!” Will called back and ran out the front with the dogs and Hannibal, careful to avoid the movers and workers. Even though Hannibal was a little older than him, he was glad it didn’t seem to bother the other boy at all.

Hannibal’s father waved with a large hand, and then watched them from the window as Hannibal followed Will out, chased by the dogs.

“Should we look in the swamp?” Hannibal suggested, immediately.

“Okay!” Will said but headed toward his house first. “Lemme tell my mama about your folks first!”

Hannibal followed Will through the field, happily. He was not usually the sort of child who enjoyed playing outside, his father tried to encourage him, but usually used the reason that Mischa needed a playmate to make his bookish son leave his drawings and piano behind.  
  
With Will, however, it wasn’t dull at all. Hannibal was not sure why that was, yet.   
  
“My father will want to see your boat. He loves boats, hunting, horses…”

“He does?” Will asked, sticking close to Hannibal, making sure he’d keep up with him as he knobby-kneed legs carried him quickly across the tree laden field back down to the small house.

“He’s always trying to make me do more things outdoors, I’ve never really wanted to until now,” Hannibal admitted, with a little smile at Will. “It’s more interesting with someone.”

Will smiled shyly over at Hannibal. “It’s why I have the dogs.” He ran up to the porch and  opened the screen door. “Mama? The Lecters said they would come for dinner!”

“Okay, darlin’, I’ll get the nice dishes out then,” Charlotte called back, and then came to the door, now in a little blue apron. “I’m makin’ peach pie too.”

“That sounds wonderful,” Hannibal said, politely, and handed Will’s mother a little piece of paper with a phone number on it. “My parents said thank you and to call to let them know what time would be best.”

Charlotte wiped her hands on the apron and took the paper. “I’ll do that now.” She shooed them back out and went to make the call.

Will snatched an apple from the bucket of them on the porch and then another for Hannibal, and gave it to him. “We’ve got a tree out back.” The sun was high in the sky now, peering out through the clouds that started to bunch up, threatening a summer rain.

“Thank you,” Hannibal said, and looked at the perfect red apple, admiring it. “We had pear trees at home, in the spring they would be covered in white blossoms, and our cook would make liquor from pears in the fall,” Hannibal said, admiring the dark sky.

Will bit into his apple as they started to walk to the swamp, slowly, looking up at the sky when Hannibal did. “Gonna rain. Does that a lot here.” The air started to grow thick and muggy, almost like the water in the air was clinging to their lungs.

“But it’s so warm,” Hannibal said, used to a much different climate, he bit into his apple, quite happy to chat about anything with Will. “I prefer rain to almost anything. The world is clean afterward.”

Thunder sounded overhead as the black angry clouds gathered and knocked together, creating friction in the sky, the sun now completely lost behind the veil of them. Will looked up, a drop of rain landing on his glasses, making him squint his eyes to see around it.

“It stays hot when it rains. I like to run around barefoot when it does.”

Hannibal laughed at that, charmed at the idea, and looked at Will as they hiked through the field. “Your parents let you?”

“Yeah, just mud,” Will shrugged, taking another bite of apple as a few more drops of rain started to fall, filling the air with moisture. Lightning crackled through the sky, lighting up the field where they walked down toward the swamp.

Hannibal did the same, and looked up at the sky with wide, dark eyes, then walked a little faster to keep pace with Will. The dogs had followed them, like babysitters, keeping an eye on the boys all the time from a few paces behind, quietly. “I’ll tell my parents it’s a custom,” he laughed.

Under the cover of large trees now, the rain hardly hit them as the bog came into view, and crickets could be heard chirping quietly.

“They don’t let you get dirty?”

“My mother dislikes anything being disorderly or dirty, my father seems to encourage it,” Hannibal laughed, and bit his apple again, looking around the swamp with fascination. He swallowed, and then smiled as he crouched to look at a little frog hidden near the base of a tree. “My father wants dogs, my mother is opposed to the idea of having them in the house.”

Will’s dogs followed them, sniffing at everything as they went. Will leaned up against a tree and finished his apple. “Must be hard. My parents love dogs.”

“Perhaps knowing your dogs will convince her, they’re very well behaved,” Hannibal said as he stood and finished his apple, struck by the way Will looked in the swamp, like he belonged in the mysterious place full of life.

Will took his glasses off and put them in his pocket of his shirt, carefully,  then pushed his hair out of his eyes, and grabbed a stick from from the ground. He wandered to the edge of the swamp, rain pinging against the water through the branches of trees, ripple the surface.

“Hopefully. Dogs are great. I like them better than people,” Will said, but looked back over his shoulder at Hannibal. “Usually.”

Hannibal stared at Will’s eyes without the glasses, reminded of the little blue flowers in Lithuania that grew wild, perfectly blue. “Usually? Am I as nice as your dogs?” Hannibal asked, hopefully, and nodded at the watching dogs without taking his eyes from Will.

Will nodded, feeling like he’d already known Hannibal forever. “Yeah.” He poked at the mud at the bank of the swamp, not many fish around this part, so the Alligators were less likely to come by, but he’d show Hannibal a better spot later.

Hannibal walked closer, and watched Will instead of the mud, smiling a little at that. “Thank you,” he said, and found his own stick, then began to make designs in the mud with it next to Will’s. “You are as nice as drawing, or playing the piano,” he admitted, almost shyly.

“You play piano?” Will asked, not surprised. “My mama taught me a little bit. I’m not very good.”

“I’m sure you’re better than you think you are,” Hannibal said, as he made designs around Will’s little poke marks in the mud, never erasing them.  
“Mama says I don’t sit still long enough,” Will laughed, which seemed true, he’d hardly stood still since the moment they met, except under the small boat.

“Playing isn’t sitting still, just moving your arms instead of your legs,” Hannibal said and reached out a hand to brush a leaf out of Will’s hair.

Will stilled, looking at Hannibal, eyes big and bright as a flash of lightning broke out over the sky just above the trees, lighting up the swamp for a moment. “I guess so.”

Hannibal looked around at the newly intense darkness, and laughed. It almost seemed like his touching Will’s hair made the swamp flash with light. “This place is strange, and beautiful,” he murmured, and sat next to Will, looking at the still water with him, disturbing it slowly with the stick in his hand. “I think things are beautiful that everyone else thinks are … strange,” Hannibal confessed, quietly.

“Is this place strange?” Will asked, not aware of it, it’s all he knew after all.

Hannibal smiled at that, and leaned back against a tall, moss-coated tree, staying close to Will as a couple of birds watched them from overhead. “I think other people wouldn’t understand. I made a book, at home, and hid it. Not even my mother knows I have it. It’s full of things I love that I don’t think people would like.”

“Can I see it sometime?” Will asked, his stick in the water, a few frogs jumped out of the water and up the bank toward them.

Hannibal watched Will watch the frogs, and moved an inch closer, their shoulders touching again. “If you promise not to tell anyone about it? Yes,” Hannibal agreed quietly, with a little smile. He used his stick to touch one of the frogs, curiously.

The frog make a deep noise and then bounced into the water again, splashing them both, and causing Will to laugh. “Who would I tell? It’ll be our secret!”

“Come back to the house with me, I’ll show you,” Hannibal said, impulsively, gripped with the need to show Will his book. Maybe Will would like it, too. Maybe…

Will stood quickly, tossing the stick out into the water, and then offered his hand to help Hannibal up. “Okay!”

Hannibal took Will’s hand, even if he knew he didn’t have to, and walked out of the swamp quickly, headed to the mansion with Will with the dogs following them. In the distance, it looked as though the trailers with horses had arrived, and were being taken to a stable behind the mansion. “Everyone is busy, perfect,” Hannibal said, as they hurried toward the house, full of energy.

The rain beat down on them, but Will kept running, laughing as they went, luckily not too soaked by the time they got to the door, the heat in the air kept them mostly dry. They sneaked into the house quietly, Will stifling his laughter as they went.

“Shh,” Hannibal said, laughing himself, and led Will and the dogs in, and up the staircase, which was abandoned at the moment.  
  
They were all bedraggled, and unkempt from the rain when Hannibal let Will into his room, which was very large, and full of boxes, a bed, a large set of shelves, and a fancy dresser.   
  
“This is my room, it will be much nicer after it’s put together,” he assured Will, and went to the dresser. He knelt on the floor to search for a little compartment under the lowest drawer, and opened it to pull out a sketch book.

Will’s eyes went wide at how nice everything was, careful not to touch anything as his boots dripped a little water on the ground under his feet. “Wow…”

Hannibal went into his bathroom, which was already mostly unpacked, and brought a deep blue towel back for Will, and a white towel for himself, then started a fire in the fireplace like he’d done it many, many times before, unsupervised. “Come sit near the fire, we’ll dry off.”

Will wrapped himself in the towel, and sat down by the fire, though hot out, it was nice to get dry faster than just standing there. “Thanks.”

Hannibal picked up the book, and closed his bedroom door quietly, then sat next to Will, and looked at him before he opened the cover, his heart beating a little faster than usual. “I’ve never shown anyone before,” Hannibal said, and took a deep breath as he opened the cover to show Will a very nice drawing of some little bones arranged into a pretty shape. “I find animals at home all the time, they never are buried properly, I like to make them prettier,” he admitted, strangely nervous as he showed Will a drawing of what was obviously a dead little bird that had been surrounded by little flowers, half-covered with a pale cloth.  
  
Hannibal chewed his lower lip, and looked at Will’s reaction, which seemed to be intense curiosity, his blue eyes never leaving the pages. Will slipped his glasses on to see a little better, and touched the drawing with his fingers.

“You drew these?” Will asked, not at all creeped out.

Hannibal nodded, silently, and noticed he was actually holding his breath as he turned the next page. It was a picture of a dead otter in a bed of twigs that looked a little like a cradle made of antlers, strangely beautiful. “I don’t kill them.”  
  
“No, why would you?” Will asked, smiling as he looked. “Death is part of life. You’ve made it little nicer for them at the end.”

“You don’t think this is weird?” Hannibal asked, and handed Will his book, watching him as he trusted Will with it.

The rest of the drawings were similar, small, dead animals arranged in increasingly beautiful and elaborate ways, the most recent ones approaching the status of art.

“No,” Will whispered, concentrated on the work in the art book, smiling a little at it, able to get a better feel for Hannibal this way. He knew something different, he just hadn’t quite placed it until now. Hannibal saw the world differently.

The last page was another bird, arranged with it’s wings open, chest opened to show it’s heart, around which Hannibal had arranged tiny leaves and flowers to fill the space of the wound that had killed it.

“I bury them, after.”

“Nice of you,” Will said, able to see the art for what it was, not morbid as some might have seen it. That was, however, Will’s gift, being able to empathize, and for that he only saw the reasons why Hannibal found beauty there.

“Mother says being beautified and buried helps the soul get to heaven,” Hannibal nodded, able to tell Will would want his dogs to get to heaven. “I think about these things when she makes us go to church,” he said, nodding at the book. “What do you like to do? Do you draw?”

Wrinkling his nose at the mention of church, Will shook his head. “I like reading when I’m not outside. Fishing with my dad. He’s gonna teach me hunt when I’m ten.”

“My Father says the same thing, when I’m older, he’ll bring me hunting, but right now I’d rather do different things,” Hannibal confessed, before the bedroom door opened after a little knock, and his mother looked inside.

“There you are, Hannibal, change for dinner please, we are leaving soon. Hello, Will, were you caught in the rain?”

Will shut the book quickly and nodded up at the regal woman with dark eyes just like her son’s.. “Yeah. That’s why we came inside.” A lie, mostly, as Will wouldn’t have minded the rain or playing in it, as the weather was warm enough he wouldn’t get sick.

“If you’d like to borrow something dry of Hannibal’s you’re welcome to it, we can all go to dinner in the car,” she said, and stepped in to smooth down Hannibal’s loose hair.  
  
He nodded, and stood to look through his dresser as his mother picked something out of his unpacked closet, and laid it on the bed for both of them.   
  
“Will, this may be slightly large, but I think it will do for you, if you’d like. We’ll be ready to go in ten minutes,” she reminded her son and smiled at Will again before stepping out.

“Thanks,” Will said, getting to his feet. Will folded the damp towel and set it by the fireplace to dry, then looked over at the clothes, much nicer than anything he owned, not even for church.  “I could just change at home,” he said to Hannibal, setting the notebook down on the bed.

“That’s alright,” Hannibal assured Will as he picked up his own outfit and began to strip down, not self-conscious in the least that way. “It’s better not to be in wet clothes anyway, especially in the car.”

The dogs were by the fireplace now that they had moved away from it, drying their fur, and Will watched Hannibal for a moment, and then started to change too, taking his boots off first and then stripped to his underwear, which was fortunately not wet, and then put the new clothes on, which seemed to swim over his tiny frame, making him laugh.

Hannibal looked over at Will as he was buttoning his own crisp white shirt, and laughed at the way he looked. “You are much smaller than I am,” he almost giggled, and went to Will to roll the sleeves for him, smiling.“You’re older than me,” Will sighed, swimming in the outfit that he knew his mother would laugh at later when the guests had gone home. He slipped his boots back on.

“How old are you?” Hannibal asked, putting a little vest on over his shirt, and then a jacket, which was a warm cinnamon color, the same as his eyes in the light of the fireplace.

“I’ll be nine soon,” Will said, and watched Hannibal, fascinated by him in ways he wasn’t sure was right, but he’d never had a friend before, so it was hard to say.

“Then you’re only a year younger,” Hannibal said as he went into the bathroom to comb his dark blonde, shiny hair into it’s usual neat style, and came out again, looking utterly perfect.

Will blinked and tried to get his curls down but gave up. He whistled the dogs over and then went to the door, sure they’d be going soon. His mama would be wondering where he might be. “You’re tall.”

Hannibal came over to Will with his comb and began to use it to comb Will’s damp curls into place, smiling at him. “My father’s tall, I hope to be his size when I’m older.”

Will flushed a little, his cheeks staining pink when Hannibal groomed him. “You’ll be a giant.”

Hannibal laughed at that, as he arranged Will’s curls, using his fingers to do so, then looked at his eyes again. “There. You look very nice,” Hannibal said, honestly, and fussed with the collar of Will’s shirt.

“I don’t think my mama’s even taken this much time to get my curls down,” Will said, very quietly, “This outfit is so stuffy. Ya know it’s just stew, right?”

“Yes, but it’s nice to be dressed well for any occasion,” Hannibal said, repeating something he heard often. “Ready?”

Will gathered his wet clothes and nodded, letting the dogs out first, and then stepped out into the regal house, which felt much emptier than his own house, which was small and closed in, homely.

Hannibal hid his book again, sure that he was going to draw a picture of Will in it later, then followed Will out, and down the big staircase where his family was waiting. 

“You look very nice,” Mrs. Lecter said, smiling at them as Count Lecter clapped his hands for the dogs to come to him.  
  
The dogs raced down the stairs and to the tall man, wagging happily as Will tugged on Hannibal’s hand, keeping close to him. “Thanks.”

“They will have to ride in the car with us,” Count Lecter said with a big smile, and led them out while his wife gave him a scathing look, but walked out, holding Mischa’s hand. Mischa was still yawning from her nap and looked back at Hannibal and Will, and waved.

“You coming?” she asked Will, excited as she was loaded into the back seat of a beautiful, polished car that looked vaguely old fashioned.

Will nodded at Mischa. “It’s my house, after all,” he teased her, and then crawled into the car after she was put in, Hannibal right behind him and then the dogs. The car was much nicer than his parents car.

The dogs climbed in at the children’s feet and hunkered down, happily while Hannibal’s father started the car, and drove down the long, cobblestone driveway to the road beyond, and turned. “You’ll have to let me know when to make my turn, Will,” he said to Will, looking at him in the rear view mirror.

“It’s not far, sir, just that second driveway on the left,” Will said, sitting up a little to point, as the house was small enough to almost miss, far enough back in the drive.

“Here we are,” he nodded, and turned into the drive, pulling up to the house to park. He got out to open his wife’s door for her, in a gentlemanly fashion, and then let the dogs run out, watching them play with a smile. “Do you have more dogs here, Will? Or only Jyn and Ben?” Hannibal asked, as they climbed out.

“There’s one other, but she’s in her own part of the house right now with the puppies,” Will explained to his friend, and scrambled out of the car, his clothes tucked under his arm.

Charlotte stepped out, no longer in her apron, but her cut off white pants and a blue sleeveless blouse. “There you are, I wondered where you’d run off to,” she smiled at Will, the clouds breaking with the sun that was now starting to set, the rain cleared.

Will handed his wet clothes to his mama. “We got caught in the storm.”

She took the clothes and ran a hand through his managed curls and looked at his clothes with a raised, surprised brow. “Ya sure did, huh? We’ll have to make sure to get these back to the Lecters… wasn’t it?” She tucked Will’s clothes under his arm, and offered her free hand to the couple. “Charlotte Graham.”

Hannibal’s mother smiled at Mrs. Graham, and offered her own, manicured hand. She was dressed simply, but elegantly, and smiled at Charlotte as they shook. “Lovely to meet you. I’m Simonetta, this is my husband Richardas Lecter,  this is my daughter Mischa, and of course you’ve met Hannibal already,” she said. “Thank you for the invitation, our kitchen is in a state at the moment, we only arrived this morning.”

  
“It’s my pleasure, it’s not everyday Will brings a friend home, or their family wants to meet us,” Charlotte said, which made Will flush, and roll his eyes.

“Likewise, Hannibal has never brought a friend home to us, we were very happy to see he’s found someone to whom he can relate so soon,” Simonetta said with an understanding smile, and a look back at the boys. “How long have you lived in the area?” she asked, everything about Simonetta was regal, but hardly stuffy around Charlotte, she was warm and genuine, looking at the modest property with fascination.

“The house was owned by my husband’s parents, so we inherited it when Will was born. I’ve lived here my whole life, Will’s father, Harvey, he’s lived around the area and up the Mississippi river his whole life. So, just about forever,” Charlotte explained, and gave Will his clothes. “Go put ‘em in the wash darlin’.”

  
Will took the clothes and dashed off into the house with Hannibal.

“It’s a beautiful area, so unique, and when we heard about the house over the hill, we took immediate interest. Do you go into the city itself often?” Hannibal’s mother asked, as the boys went into the little house, followed by Mischa, who wanted to go everywhere with them.

“Where do you wash your clothes?” Hannibal asked Will, the concept of doing that themselves foreign to the boy.

Charlotte explained the local area to the Lecters, and how they only ever went on special occasions, as Will stuck the clothes into the washing machine in the mud room.

“Right here.” There were more of his clothes waiting to be washed, so he stuffed them all in and put some soap into the little drawer. “See?”

Hannibal and Mischa watched, and Mischa stood on her tip-toes to try to smell the detergent. “Mmm!” she said, impressed with the flowery smell.

“And then you can walk away from it?” Hannibal asked, examining the machine as the adults came into the house.

Will nodded, and set the lid down to let it wash. “It washes it all while we go do something else.”

Charlotte showed them around the house, not large, a small living room with a television that was hidden inside a cupboard, as they didn’t have it on often. The kitchen was small but efficient, and the dining room wasn’t large, but she managed to get the leaves out for the modest table to extend it, and a couple other chairs.

A truck sputtered to a stop in the drive, and the dogs went crazy, running out the front door, meeting a slightly lighter haired man, bearded with wisps of red and blond mixed with the brown. Will ran out after the dogs and hugged his father tightly around the middle, and the man picked him up and swung him around. “Hey, you wouldn’t happen to know anythin’ about that fancy car in the drive would ya?” Harvey asked, and that was when he looked up to see Hannibal, Mischa, and their parents in the house. “Oh I see.”

“That’s Hannibal, my friend, and his sister Mischa, and his parents,” Will whispered.

“A friend?”

“Mhm.”

The Count, much taller than Will’s father, stepped forward and offered his hand. “Richardas Lecter. We moved into the house over the hill this morning, I hope we are not imposing.”“Not at all,” Harvey said, shaking the Count’s hand with a firm, calloused grip. “Harvey Graham. I guess you’ve met Will and the dogs, and my wife already.”

“Yes, we’ve met. This is my wife, Simonetta,” he said, making the formal introduction, at while Hannibal’s mother shook Harvey’s hand.

“Lovely to meet you,” she nodded.  
  
“Your dog is having puppies?” Richardas asked, and Simonetta gave a barely audible sigh. “What breed?”

Harvey set Will down and laughed. “He told you did he?” He gave his son a look, but let him run off to help Charlotte finish setting the table. “She is, she’s not any one breed. We take in strays, she’s mixed breed of a lot of big dogs.”

“I’ve been considering a hunting dog for quite some time,” Richardas murmured, while Hannibal followed Will, who was followed by Mischa, like a little train of Lecters behind Will wherever he went.

“May I help?” Hannibal offered.

The two men talked dogs, as Will’s father loved to do, and Will handed Hannibal some silverware for the table while he grabbed the glasses to set out over the bowls and plates.

“Mama and I always make dinner and set the table, and my dad cleans up afterwards,” Will explained, as if that were just how things were done.

Hannibal began to set silverware on the table, lining everything up very, very carefully as Mischa took napkins, and waved them around to ‘help’. “I’ve never set a table before,” Hannibal admitted, smiling as he made everything look as perfect as possible. “It’s rather nice. Calming.”

Will showed Mischa how to fold the napkins and put them under the silverware, carefully, and then went to find his old booster seat from when he was a little boy, to put at her spot so she could sit up at the table with them.

Mrs. Lecter stepped into the kitchen and showed Charlotte a bottle of wine. “We brought a bottle for the hostess, if you’d like I can open it now, let it breathe,” she suggested.

Will watched his mother get flustered, having never even seen wine in the house before. “Please,” Charlotte said, and went to find _nicer_ glasses for the adults.

“I was not sure what would compliment your stew,” Simonetta said, as she found a corkscrew and opened the bottle smoothly. “I hope it’s appropriate. May I help with anything else?” she offered, able to see how flustered Charlotte was.

Harvey offered his wife a smile, and she shook his head. “It’s alright, we’re just about ready if everyone wants to come and sit down.”

She set the nice glasses out for the adults, the two parents together on either side, the boys together, and Mischa by her parents. Charlotte set the cornbread out and then served up the stew into bowl and set them out in front of each spot. It was much less messy this way, and she didn’t want to ruin their nice clothes.

Harvey kissed her cheek; “It looks good, darlin’,” he whispered, touching her elbow and showed their guest to their seats, Will helping Mischa into her spot, and gave her cup with a sippy lid on it with milk.

The Lecters sat at the table, and Simonetta took it upon herself to pour wine for everyone, Charlotte first.

“It smells very nice,” Hannibal said, interested in the dish as Mischa reached for Corn bread.

“Thank you,” Charlotte said, and Will could sense that she was having trouble as much as he usually did, social standards weren’t really how his mother and himself worked. She passed the cornbread around, a simple dish and a simple side, and wished she thought of something better to make.

Will dug into his stew, picking out all the best fish pieces first.

The Lecters took the food, and Hannibal’s mother made pleasant conversation while everyone began to eat, taking the pressure off of Charlotte before she tried the stew. “This is very good, it reminds me of Cioppino, a fish stew we had back home, but with spice,” she praised.

“It’s Cajun,” Charlotte said, simply. “Lots of that sort of food of around here, if ya like it.” Charlotte went on to talk about the ingredients in the stew, something to keep her mind occupied.

Will nudged Hannibal, quiet himself as all the people got together, his mind became muddled, and it was hard to concentrate, to pick just one person to focus on, so he picked Hannibal instead.

“I enjoy bold flavours,” Simonetta smiled, as pleased with the novel food as though they’d been served in a beautiful restaurant. “I think we’ll enjoy this place, very much. Of course, you must let us return the favour,” Mrs. Lecter said, then took another bite.

Hannibal nodded his approval at Will, and Mischa did her best with her fork, but stuffed fish in her mouth with her fingers.

The rest of the meal was had with some happy chit chat, Charlotte only having a little of the wine, while Harvey enjoyed most of his own and her’s. Once the meal was finished, dessert was served, with flair by Will’s mother, who seemed very proud of her peach pie.

“It’s not pecan, which is Will’s favorite, but peaches are in season right now.”

“It smells divine,” Hannibal’s mother proclaimed and looked the pie over, appreciatively while Mischa made ‘ooh’ sounds and tried to sit very still to be awarded a piece.

“I’ve never had pecan pie,” Hannibal said to Will, already memorizing his new friend’s favorite dessert, and filing the information away for later.

Charlotte served it up as Will looked at Hannibal. “Never? They serve it lots here at Thanksgiving and Christmas,” Will drawled out.

“I’ve also never had Thanksgiving,” Hannibal said with a little smile, and thanked Will’s mother for the pie when he was served.

“No? What do you celebrate there?” Will asked, confused honestly about Hannibal's culture.

“Christmas, Easter, The Day of Souls,” Hannibal said, and tried a bit of the pie, which the grown-ups were already praising.

“Day of souls?” Will asked, brow raised. “Like Halloween?” Sounded like it, but he wasn’t too sure. He scooped into his pie, still warm, and hummed around the spoon.

“The Day of Souls is in November, we light candles in cemeteries,” Hannibal explained, and watched Will devour his pie, happy to watch him do anything. “We have a holiday called Carnival,” Hannibal said, between bites of pie. “Everyone dresses up in costume, with masks, people dance with one another in the street, and children go from door to door for candy.”

“Sorta like Halloween,” Will said, shoving more pie into his mouth slowly, taking his last bite and then followed it down with some milk. “We go door to door in costumes and ask for candy. I… like it, you can wear a mask and no one can see you.”

Hannibal’s mother smiled a little at that, listening to the boys talk, comparing cultures.  
  
“Sometimes a mask is the only thing that allows people to see who you really are, inside. It gives people courage to be themselves,” Mrs. Lecter said, cryptically.   
  
Will looked down at his hands, and his own mother reached over to touch his shoulder, just once. “For years he would only ever go as a dog. I couldn’t get him to go as much else.”

Hannibal’s mother gave Will a genuine smile, and nodded. “A dog is a powerful animal, and a very good friend: loyal, strong, fit to be gentle with children or charge in a war. I think that’s a very good choice.”  
  
Hannibal smiled a little, and gave Will’s elbow a little touch, like Will’s mother did.

“I didn’t go last year, there were too many kids,” Will admitted, mostly to Hannibal, who he knew would under him.

“I prefer to watch Carnival than to be in it,” Hannibal agreed, and whispered to his friend as the adults began to talk again. “This year we could dress up together.”

“Are you staying that long?” Will asked, sure that this was a summer thing for people like Hannibal and his family, but he would be lying if he didn’t admit he was a little happy to hear it.

“Mother said at least until Christmas,” Hannibal answered. He hadn’t been happy about the move to America, but it was not bad at all.

“Good,” Will smiled over at Hannibal and then got up to help move the dishes off the table and to the counter. His father was supposed to do the dishes, but Will thought he’d be nice and get started on them.

Hannibal followed, which made his mother smile as she handed him his plate, and watched as Hannibal carried dishes over to the sink with Will. She looked at Will’s parents over her glass of wine, and spoke in a low voice.  
  
“They are already quite close.”

“Will doesn’t make friends too often,” Harvey said, finishing up his own slice of pie. “I don’t think we’ve ever had him bring someone over, let alone for dinner.”

“I’m glad to see Hannibal has made a friend who can convince him to put down his books and go outdoors,” Richardas smiled. “The boy needs to learn there is life away from the piano and the library.”

“Will has very vivid imagination,” Charlotte explained. “Sometimes reading too many fantasy books gives him nightmares, so we make sure he gets outdoors enough.”

“Good for both of them,” Richardas nodded as he watched Hannibal help Will, absorbed in their own conversation.

“Does Will attend public school?” Hannibal’s mother asked, with a gentle tilt of her head.

“He does. They don’t understand him though, and he has to attend with the other… ‘special’ kids, which I think is ridiculous, but Will can’t function around too many others,” Charlotte explained, hands in her lap, clearly feeling a bit of guilt for that.

“But he does very well,” Harvey interjected, arm around Charlotte’s shoulders. “Once he learns to control that empathy of his, he’ll be able to move into bigger classes.”

“I have heard American schools are not very accommodating. I cannot imagine Hannibal would last more than a couple of days in a regular environment, either. He finds his peers difficult,” Mrs. Lecter said.

“Will you put him into the private Catholic school?” Harvey asked, sipping the last bit of the wine, far more a drinker than his wife was. “That’s all there is here, public or private.”

“We prefer to handle his education ourselves, even in Lithuania. We’re looking into tutors in the area right now. Hannibal has an unusually voracious mind,” Hannibal’s father chuckled, proudly. “He gets that from his mother.”

Mrs. Lecter just chuckled at the mention, and sipped her wine.

“We’ve thought about doin’ that, but we haven’t the money is all, tutors cost so much, and the public school system is free,” Harvey said, just a tad uncomfortable, and cleared his throat, glancing over Charlotte’s shoulder at the boys. “Plus the interaction is good for him, helps him get used to the other kids.”

“If Will is able to take a semester away from public school, he’s welcome to learn from our tutor,” the Count said, with a shrug.

“Hannibal could use a classmate,” Hannibal’s mother admitted as she watched the boys talked.

“That’s very nice of you-” Charlotte started to say but Will heard it and ran over, hands full of suds.

“Could I mama?” he asked, his combed curls were out of sorts again, in his eyes, covering his glasses.

“We’ll have to talk to school, Will.”

“ _Pleeeaaaassee_?” he asked, begging, pleading with his mother to take him out for even just one semester.

“Will-” Charlotte sighed, and looked over at husband, who just shrugged, sandy colored brows lifted into his hairline. “I’ll call the school in the mornin’, and ask, we have to register you anyway for the fall.”

Will hugged his mother tightly for that and ran back over to finish the dishes, gushing to Hannibal quietly about being able to do school with him in a few months.

Charlotte stood to get some containers; “Leftovers to go?” she asked, quietly, and went about putting everything into smaller containers to keep while the boys polished cutlery clean together, whispering back and forth.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Edits by us and no beta.  
> 2) Like what you see? Follow us on Tumblr! @ [Construct Fairytales](http://constructfairytales.tumblr.com)

 

Will and Hannibal spent the next few weeks tumbling around between their yards, and Will showed him the big tire swing over the swamp, that they had to be extra careful on so they didn’t fall in. Will was waiting for the perfect time to suggest going into the main city for the alligator treats, wanting to see if Hannibal liked it as much as he did. Then, one day, his father said he had a few errands to run in town and offered to take the boys with him.

They all piled into his rickety truck, that bounced along the back-roads, and then onto the main roads and over the bridge into New Orleans. The drive took less than an hour and Will’s father parked near the water, near the main street where the boys could look around the shops if they wanted.

“Now, be back here in an hour. I’m gettin’ some parts from Earl, alright? You know where to find me,” Harvey said, and gave Will a few dollars, not much to do anything with.

“Thank you, Mr. Graham,” Hannibal nodded politely.

Harvey waved and left, and Will took Hannibal’s hand to show him everything. “This cafe, you can get fried pastries,” Will said, showing Hannibal as someone walked by. “Ya cover ‘em in powdered sugar while they’re still hot. So good.”

“They smell good,” Hannibal said after he took a deep breath of the air as a man with a bag of the pastries passed them.

Will had just enough for a few of them, and ran inside to buy a bag, and then came back out. He handed the bag to Hannibal, and then took a huge bite of a beignet he had pulled out of the bag on his way over, puffing the sugar all over his nose and glasses with a laugh.

Hannibal used his sleeve to brush the sugar off of Will’s nose, then took his glasses off for him, and brushed them off for him too. “Your eyes look so big without these,” Hannibal said, as he picked a pastry out of the bag.

“I can see pretty okay without ‘em too,” Will said, mouthful, and laughing, nose scrunched up. “They help me focus though, block people out…”

Hannibal ate the pastry with a little, content sigh, and hummed. “It’s like a horse’s blinders, then?” he asked, sneaking a lick of the sugar from his fingertips.

“I guess so,” Will shrugged, licking his fingers clean on one hand and then ate another bite from the pastry in the other. “It’s a barrier, mama says. Helps a little.”

“Is your mother the same way you are?” Hannibal asked, watching Will the same way a kitten might watch a bird through a window, transfixed by everything he did.

“Yeah. She says I got it worster though,” Will said, smiling up at Hannibal, who seemed to have grown over the last few weeks, while Will was still quite small.

“You can tell what people are like, just looking at them … what did you think I was like when you saw me?” Hannibal asked, locking his amber brown eyes on Will’s blues with a tilt of his head.

“Well, not just lookin’ at them, but taking in their,” he gestured to himself, but all over with little hands, “ya know, overall-ness, and the little things. I don’t find everyone weird, I empathize and I can understand  _ why _ they’re that way,” Will said, even if he didn’t understand it all just yet, too young still.

“Did you think I was weird?” Hannibal asked, as he took the last beignet, and split it in two as carefully as he could, then gave Will half.

Taking the half, Will smiled up at his friend. “No. I don’t see people that way.”

“You said you don’t find  _ everyone _ weird, I was wondering if perhaps it was a compliment.” Hannibal’s English was becoming more and more clear every day that he spoke to Will, but he still tried hard to make sure Will understood him. To his credit, Will seemed to.

“I see them as people, not weird. You’re a person to me, with slightly different hobbies, I guess.” Will shrugged and licked his fingers clean.

Hannibal seemed content with that, if a little disappointed, and threw the bag in a trash can, then brushed his hands clean of powdered sugar while he looked at Will. “Are the alligators for eating close?” he asked, looking around.

Will nodded and took his hand again, aware he might have hurt Hannibal’s feelings, but no one had caught Will’s attention quite like Hannibal had. “This way.”

Hannibal’s face brightened at that, and he let Will lead him by the hand quite happily, smiling just a little at him. “How many have you eaten? Are they tough?”

“Chewy, but not bad,” Will said with a smile, leading Hannibal down and alley to a food faire, where a stand sat with the treat.

Hannibal smiled, his fingers still wound in Will’s. He let Will led him through the alley, quite happily, his moment of downcast mood alleviated. “Two alligators, please,” Hannibal said to the vendor, and reached into his pocket with his free hand to pull out a bill, rather thrilled by the request he just made.

The man served them up in tinfoil and on a stick, and gave one to each of them and broke the bill for Hannibal.

“There you go boys,” he said, smiling at them as Will set off toward the river walk.

Hannibal thanked the vendor, and stared at his partially wrapped alligator, fascinated by the sight of the exotic meat, even if the fried batter around it made it look rather like anything else fried.

“It smells good, rather like chicken. Is everything fried in this country?” Hannibal asked, impertinently, as they passed stand after stand of fried this and that.

Laughing at that, Will shook his shaggy head of curls, damp from the muggy weather. Will’s hair was a mess that Hannibal found himself eager to touch at any opportunity. “No, there's lots not fried. Mama says fried isn't that good for ya, so she don't make it a lot.”

They reached the water with their purchased treats, and Hannibal stole a look at his through the foil wrapping. “Are there alligators in this water, too? Or only in the swamp?”

A group of kids about their age milled around not too far away, watching them.

“Just the swamp, we can wrap them up to take home if ya want?” Will suggested, looking at the other kids behind his bangs, and slumped against Hannibal a little.

“That sounds good,” Hannibal agreed, and gave Will a little half-hug as he hid a little against Hannibal at the sight of the other boys, who laughed.“Do you know them?”

“Sorta,” Will said, swallowing, his jaw tight. He’d gotten into an altercation once, someone said something horrible about his mother, that she once tried to kill herself, and Will punched one of the boys. Will was let off because of his ‘condition’ and the boys just laughed at him since for not being more of boy about it.

Hannibal turned his head slowly, and gave the boys who seemed to disturb Will a cool look over, then looked back at Will. “Ignore them, they’re very  _ dull _ ,” Hannibal said softly, as though that were something his mother had said to him when he was younger.   
  
The boys came closer, chuckling.   
  
“Hey, Will, who’s your boyfriend?” one of them taunted, and all four of them burst out laughing.   
  
Cheeks darkening pink, Will glared at the boys at they got closer. He'd be so glad for a semester away from them. “Buzz off!” Will said, taking Hannibal's hand to go back to his father's truck. His mama said to ignore them and walk away if they ever taunted him again.

Hannibal sighed and turned away with Will after giving the boys a disdainful look. “Where should we go next?” Hannibal asked, conversationally, when one of the boys hands landed on his shoulder, stopping him.

“Why’d you talk so funny? What’s the matter, you don’t know English? Are you some kinda retard?” the largest boy drawled.   
  
Hannibal’s eyes changed, going cold as he looked at the hand on his shoulder, then the boy’s face. Will's light blue eyes seemed to go dark, like a stormy sea, and put one hand over the one on Hannibal's shoulder, snack tucked into his pocket for now, then pushed Hannibal's head to the side, out of the way, and punched the kid in the face square on, in the nose.

The blood on his knuckles woke some sort of realization in Will and he stared at Hannibal in shock as the other boy started to howl in pain.

Hannibal’s eyes also went wide when the boy staggered back, clutching his nose, and he realized little Will had punched him, hard enough to break his nose. Hannibal smiled a little at that, and then one of the other boys reached a hand for  _ Will _ .   
  
Hannibal set his wrapped treat on the ground, then straightened to grab two of the boy’s fingers, and wrenched them backward until the angry boy shouted and writhed to get away from him. Hannibal didn’t let up, just fisted the boy’s shirt with his other hand to keep him from getting away while he bent his fingers back.   
  
“ _ Don’t _ be rude to my friend,” Hannibal said, eyes locked with the other boy’s as he kept forcing the fingers out of the joint.   
  
“Lemme go! LEMME GO!” the boy hollered, his face going bright red.   
  
“Promise,” Hannibal said, calmly, in contrast to Will’s righteous fury.   
  
“Yeah! Okay, promise!” the squirming boy said, in tears from the pain.

Will was numb with shock that he'd done it again, that he had let his blind anger take over. He forced his hand against Hannibal's to loosen his grip and then pulled them both away. He'd be in trouble as it was.

Hannibal stopped, instantly, and looked at Will, not at the boy running away holding his damaged hand. “Should we go?” he asked, and picked up his wrapped alligator skewer as casually as though they had just played a game, and not injured two bullies.

The younger of them nodded slowly, and clutched Hannibal's hand, fingers clasped together, twined. “Let’s take our treats and save ‘em for the swamp.”

“Did you hurt your hand on that boy’s face?” Hannibal asked, with concern as he looked at the blood on Will’s knuckles, and spotted a public bathroom, steering Will into it.

Will wrapped their treats more tightly in their foil as they walked into the restroom, then laid his hand out under the cool water, blood rinsing off clean. Will’s little knuckles would be a little swollen but not bad. “It's okay,” he whispered, still high off of watching the bully squirm, and Hannibal’s delight in it.   
  
Hannibal let Will hold their food in his free hand as he reached into the sink, and helped get the blood off under the cold water with his hand. He shut the water off and wrapped Will’s knuckles with paper towel to dry them, being very, very gentle. “It’s going to swell.”   
  
Will chewed his bottom lip at the thought, sure he'd get grounded now. “My parents are gonna be mad.”   
  
“Why? That boy grabbed me, and you stopped him,” Hannibal said, still holding Will’s hand in his own as they talked.   
  
“Yeah, but I’ve done it before, and they said I wasn’t allowed to touch anyone, or hurt anyone again. His parents might come after mine,” Will said, understanding only that the parents of both kids would have issues, and Will didn’t want to be the cause of more grief with his parents.

“What could his parents possibly do to yours?” Hannibal asked, confused.

“I dunno, dad said something about money, and uh, uhm… lawsuit?” Will scrunched up his nose, not really sure what it all meant, but it made his mama upset, and he didn’t want that. He moved his fingers, his knuckles hurting a little but pulled his hand back. “Maybe Peter won’t say anythin’.”

Hannibal looked Will in the eye, as he rubbed the back of his own neck with his other hand. “Don’t worry. We’ll tell my parents. They won’t be mad. You were helping me, so they’ll help you,” Hannibal said, with a cryptic, tight little smile. He understood a lot about his parents world for a child his age, then dropped his hand from his neck with a little sigh. “Let’s go eat our treats, they’re getting cold.”   
  
They walked back to the truck, waiting for Will’s father to come back, and ate their treats in companionable silence as they sat side by side on the runner board, the meat still warm. They could taunt alligators later, of course.

“What did you boys get into?” Harvey asked, setting a pile of motor parts into the back of the truck, looking at Will’s sugar coated cheeks and their empty sticks.

“Will took me to a cafe for pastries, and then we bought alligator on a stick,” Hannibal said, happily, his eyes alight with the new culinary experience.

Harvey looked Will over and then Hannibal, something not quite right, but didn’t say a thing. “Alright, are we ready to go then, boys?”

Will nodded and crawled into the truck, tucking his hand in under himself until Hannibal got in and then grabbed his hand instead. Hannibal curled his hand over Will’s, hiding the bruised part, and laced their fingers together with a little smile as they sat together. “We ran into a few of Will’s … classmates,” Hannibal sighed.

Eyes lighting up with fury, Will looked over at his  _ friend _ as if he had ratted him out. Harvey started up the truck and gave Will and Hannibal both another once over.

“Did you, now?”

Hannibal gave Will a look, as though to say he knew what he was doing, and rested his shoulder against Will’s. “I suppose they don’t like foreigners, Mr. Graham.”

“Will?” Harvey asked, looking at his son as he drove the car out of the lot, eyes back on the road, but clearly worried.

“They were makin’ fun of him, dad. Calling him my boyfriend like there was somethin’ wrong with that, and making fun of the way he talked.”

“The largest boy grabbed me by the neck, and was about to hit me,” Hannibal said, with a hard swallow. “But then Will stepped in, thankfully. I’m not a fighter, I would not have known what to do…” he said, and smiled a little at Will, his hero.

At the stop, Harvey looked over at Will, prying his hand from Hannibal’s to look at his knuckles. “The same boys?”

“Yes, dad.” Will ducked his head, and Harvey let his hand go with a sigh. He pulled into a gas station and got out. When he returned he gave Will a small bag of ice and set it over his knuckles.

“Don’t tell your mother. We’ll sort it out if something comes of it.” He got back in and they started their way back home.

Will held the ice to his knuckles, and leaned in against Hannibal, not sure why he spun the story so differently, but it seemed his father took to it better this way. Hannibal gave Will a thankful look, and took the ice for him, holding it to his hand.

“We won’t tell Mrs. Graham, but is it alright if I tell my parents? I think it’s right they should know,” Hannibal said, hesitantly to Mr. Graham.   
  
“Well if you think you must,” Harvey drawled, as they crossed the bridge back to their neck of the New Orleans area. He looked older now, worried even.   
  
“Will said that those boys were bothering him before?” Hannibal asked, sitting closer to his friend. He managed to look even younger somehow, utterly unused to a world of bullies.   
  
“Some months back, right Will? They like to pick on kids who don’t have as much as they do, or are different,” Will’s father said, explaining as Will sighed and looked out the window. “He got in a bit of trouble for shoving one of them.”

“He called mama a crazy whore,” Will whispered, angrily.

“What sort of trouble? The boy was being cruel,” Hannibal said, protective of Will, reacting as though he didn’t know any of this. He rested his head against Will’s to calm him, a little.

“The school doesn’t take kindly to physical contact, so he was expelled for a few days,” Harvey said, though honestly glad his boy had enough sense in him to stick up for himself. “Lucky this didn’t happen there, or we’d have to find something else completely for you, Will.”

Will huffed out a sigh, his smaller body going slack at the thought. He really could only hope to never go to public school again.

“Why not tell these boys’ parents? Won’t they punish them?” Hannibal asked, innocently as they neared the mansion.   
  
“Oh, they don’t care. It’s their word against Will’s, and Will was the one who was physical, not them,” Harvey said, knowingly, and pulled into the mansion drive to let the boys out. “I’ll figure out what to say to your mother if they call, Will. Go play.”

Will nodded and pushed Hannibal a little out the door, and slid out himself, holding the ice to his knuckles, even still.

“Thank you, Mr. Graham. I’m sorry if I caused any trouble,” Hannibal said, sincerely, and climbed out with Will, then closed the door of the truck, softly, and watched it as Harvey drove away. “We should go speak to my Mother,” Hannibal said, looking at the house, calmly.   
  
“I don’t want any trouble, Hannibal,” Will said, looking up at his friend, who seemed to adore the troubles Will tried to get himself out of.

Hannibal tousled Will’s curls with his hand, and then patted them down, smiling at him. “No trouble at all, just what’s coming to them,” Hannibal promised, and put an arm around Will’s back as he led him inside. “How is your hand?” he asked, as they stepped in.

“It’ll be okay,” Will said, just glad to be at Hannibal’s side, and that he didn’t mind that Will had defended him, that he didn’t mind what they said about them, where most kids would have parted and never looked at each other the same again.

“Should we take you to the doctor? What if it’s broken?” Hannibal asked, leading Will into his mother’s study, where his father watched her paint something, both of them in mid-conversation when the boys walked in.   
  
“What’s happened to your hand?” Richardas asked, immediately, looking at Will.   
  
Will wiggled his fingers, about to mention how unbroken they were when Hannibal’s parents looked at him, and he got caught off guard. 

“I… I punched someone.”

Hannibal went to his mother, and stood near her as he explained what happened in Italian, gesturing parts of the story to illustrate what had happened. She looked concerned, then touched the back of Hannibal’s neck sympathetically, and finally …  _ furious _ . A dark look came over her eyes, and she muttered to herself in rapid Italian as she crossed the room and snatched her phone from the table, dialing. She spoke more, even faster Italian into the phone as Richardas watched, eyebrows raised, and looked Will’s knuckles over.

“They don’t look broken. Why don’t you boys go out and see the horses for a little while? The new foal should be born any day now,” he said.   
  
Mrs. Lecter lowered the phone and fixed Will with a look, her voice calm toward him, but fury underneath. “What are these boys named?” she asked Will, and set her jaw.

Will rattled of the four boys names, first and last, and then took Hannibal’s hand and booked it out fast. He didn’t know what was going to happen, but he didn’t want to be around for it either. It looked like a massive headache for Will in the end.

Hannibal exited with Will, headed for the stables, and watched him carefully. “You’re not in trouble. I told her you were defending me. You  _ were _ ,” he said, simply.

“Yeah, I was, but… I shouldn’t have hit him,” Will said, conflicted between the right and wrong thing to do. It had started to rain out, the air thick again around them.   
  
Hannibal led Will into the stables, which were quiet, and filled with calm horses, then closed the heavy door behind them. “He deserved to be hit,” Hannibal said with a little shrug. “If you didn’t, I would have.”   
  
“Hitting doesn’t make it better though. It just makes people afraid, and for what?” Will took his glasses off and put them in his pocket, rubbing his eyes. It was difficult sometimes to get his own emotions out when he had so many running through him. “I mean, he did deserve it, it felt  _ good _ to hit him.”

“It feels good to hit bad people.” Hannibal brushed Will’s wild curls out of his eyes. “Why shouldn’t it feel good to stop someone from being like that? Isn’t that what God tells angels to do?” Hannibal asked, with a little smile.   
  
Will slumped down against the gate of the stable, and pulled Hannibal with him with his good hand. His bright blue eyes gazed at him. “I’m not an angel though.”   
  
“I think you are,” Hannibal said, honestly, looking at Will with an intense stare. He was more and more attached to him every day. His first thought in the morning was going to see Will, and his last thought at night was about when he could see Will the next day. They had become inseparable.

Blinking big blue eyes up at Hannibal, Will smiled, brows raised into his bangs as he leaned against his shoulder. “Me?”

“Of course,” Hannibal said, and settled in to sit against the gate with Will. The horses watched them too, especially the black and white pregnant mare opposite them. “You stood up for me, I’ve never had a friend who did that before. It was nice.”

“I got mad,” Will admitted. “Just like when they said…  _ that _ about my mother.” He rested his hands on his own lap, booted feet out straight in front of him, not quite as long as Hannibal’s.

Hannibal bent his legs a little so that his foot could rest against Will’s while they talked. “They need someone to teach them that they can’t be rude like that. If you don’t stand up to them, who will? I’m proud of you,” Hannibal admitted, even if that much was obvious.

Will wiggled his fingers at his friend, showing his hand was fine, just a little sore and bruised from it, and not as bad as Will thought. The more he talked it over with Hannibal, the less awful he felt. “Yeah?”

“You and I can’t be the only ones they’re like that to. Maybe now they won’t pick on someone else, they’ll find something else to do, like drag their knuckles around all day,” Hannibal joked, as he touched Will’s bruised hand and leaned against him, almost snuggling.   
  
“It might take more than a punch to the nose and you almost breaking his fingers to get them to stop with everyone, but at least it won’t be me,” Will said, hopeful.

“No, it won’t be you,” Hannibal said, and touched Will’s fingers softly. “I think they’re going to be very sorry for picking on you.”   
  
Will spread his fingers, knuckles still sore, and looped them between Hannibal’s, entwining them. He’d never had a friend, he didn’t know if it was supposed to be like this, but Will was enamoured with his new friend beyond belief. Someone that didn’t make fun of him, someone that didn’t see his ‘disorder’ as an issue, but a blessing.

Hannibal looked at Will with a sparkle in his dark eyes. “Can I show you another secret?” Hannibal asked, grinning.

Will nodded his head of curls, smiling brighter now. He liked secrets.

Hannibal leaned his head forward, and pulled his shirt collar away, and showed Will deep, already purpling fingermarks at the back of his neck, dotted with small blossoms of dried blood.   
  
“I did that to myself in the bathroom when you weren’t looking,” Hannibal confessed.

“Just today, in the city?” Will asked, looking at it. “You told your mom they touched you?” He wasn’t even mad, he was  _ impressed _ .

Hannibal nodded, and smiled a little when he saw Will’s expression. “That’s why I told her in Italian, so you couldn’t look surprised. He  _ did _ touch me, after all, just a little below that, he very well could have bruised me…” Hannibal said, with a little mischievous glint in his dark eyes.

True enough, and the other boys weren’t close enough to see how hard he had gripped Hannibal or not. Will touched the bruising with his fingers of his other hand, biting his lip. “You’d do that to yourself just to help us not be in as much trouble?”

“It’s worth it,” Hannibal said, and closed his eyes at the soft brush of Will’s fingers over the sore spot. “They deserve it. They were rude to you.” Hannibal Looked back at Will.

“I don’t care, it’s everyone they’re mean to I care about,” Will admitted softly, leaning up against Hannibal head on his shoulder as he drew patterns against the bruises.

The boys were curled together in the stable while the storm started to blow in from outside, which made some of the horses whinny nervously. Hannibal, however, could not be more content. “My mother was calling lawyers, I don’t think they are going to do anything like that for a very, very long time,” Hannibal murmured, with his nose nuzzled against the shoulder of Will’s shirt as the pregnant horse began to pace in her stall, uncomfortable.

“I hope not,” Will sighed, comfortable with Hannibal enough to be snuggled up like this, taking comfort in each other, even if Will maybe needed it more than Hannibal did. “Are the horses okay?”

“The storm makes them nervous,” Hannibal murmured, curled up with Will. He looked up, however, at the heavily pregnant mare, and frowned as the mare paced and paced. “But she’s about to have a foal any day, now.”

“Is she? Should we get your parents?” Will asked, sure his own parents would need to be there when the dog had puppies.

“My father has a veterinarian arranged, he’ll call him, we should get him,” Hannibal said, as he stood and opened the doors against strong winds that had come in, suddenly, the skies nearly black as the mother horse shifted around in her stall.

Standing, Will frowned a little at the horse and then ran out with Hannibal to get the Count. They ran into the house, the wind howling outside, dangerously high.   
  
Both boys were rumpled and a mess as they ran into the house, and Hannibal found his father, who called a vet, then hung up and put on a coat. “He’ll be here as soon as he can, I’m going to watch over her,” he said, buttoning up.   
  
“What can we do?” Will asked, not sure what  _ they _ could do honestly, they were just kids.

“Do you want to see?” Richardas asked, and Hannibal nodded enthusiastically. “It could be bloody,” he warned Will, aware that would not be an issue for Hannibal at all.

Will just nodded his head slowly. He’d never seen a lot of blood or a baby being born before, it would be fun. Right? “Yeah, I wanna.”

Hannibal gave Will a coat, and put one on, himself, and Richardas nodded that they could follow. “Very well, come with me, stay close, the storm is bad.”

They ran in the wind to the stables, all three of them struggling against the high wind. Hannibal held Will’s hand tightly, as though afraid he might be blown away. Lightning flashed overhead, and thunder rumbled in the distance, getting closer with every strike.  Rain poured down thick and hot over them as they got to the stable, the horses whinnying in side.

Richardas made sure the boys were inside, and went to the pacing mare, then opened her stall to watch her pace restlessly. “Poor beauty, her name is Raven’s Heart, we call her Raven,” he sighed, and brushed his hand over her neck trying to calm her as they waited for the vet. She leaned down and sniffed at Will’s curls, then laid on the floor, on her side, trying to get comfortable.   
  
“She must be almost ready,” Richardas sighed, and looked outside for any sign of the vet.

“What… what happens now?” Will asked, curious and confused, he had a lot of imagination, but he had never even read about this before. “She will give birth, her body knows what to do, we can only watch and hope for the best until the vet gets here. Keeping her calm would be ideal,” he sighed, and crouched, trying to soothe the laboring horse. Will walked over to the horse and stood at her head and then sat down and hugged her, petting her mane with his small hands, his face against her’s.

The horse calmed when Will did that, breathing slowly against him as her flank twitched and heaved. Richardas stared at the boy, while Hannibal beamed, watching as the horse began to settle, less panicky with Will there with her like that.   
  
A car pulled up outside, and Richardas looked out. “Thank God, the vet. Keep doing that, Will…”

Will was good with animals, like people he could empathize to a point, and the mama here was very scared and in a lot of pain, he just wanted to calm her so the baby could be born healthy and calm, too. He smiled up at Hannibal, big blue eyes looking larger than ever next to the horse.

Hannibal touched Will’s shoulder as the vet made it inside, with his bag in hand, and began to take off his coat. “Good God, she’s already pushing, she’s not in a panic, that’s good …” the vet noticed Will, surprised. “Well, she likes  _ you _ , son. Stay with her, and I’ll see about the foal,” he said, and put on long gloves, then brought his bag to the horse’s back end as she pushed.   
  
Minutes later, the foal was born, still wrapped in a translucent sac, which the vet helped it out of. The mother horse bent back and cleaned the foal, which was jet black from head to toe. It’s mane, tail, and even it’s eyes were black.   
  
“This one’s going to be a beauty,” the vet smiled, as he checked the baby over, and helped his mother wipe him off, with a clean, dry cloth, then put down a soft blanket for the foal to lay on and get his bearings.   
  
“What will you name it?” Will asked Hannibal, still in awe of what had happened, his little imaginative mind was taking it all in, filing every precious detail away.   
  
“We usually take the baby’s name from it’s mother and father,” Hannibal explained, and pointed at the big black horse with a brown mane who was looking over the edge of the next stall at the mother and baby.   
  
“That’s the father, Swift Stag, and his mother is Raven’s Heart. The baby will be Ravenstag,” Hannibal said, and watched with Will as Ravenstag took his first breaths, shiny and black with big, dark eyes.   
  
“Ravenstag?” Will asked, and then repeated the name with a little smile, his imagination making something else of the name all together, a beautiful horse indeed, with feathers and wings. The tiny horse blinked at Will as it’s mother shifted closer, and nuzzled the black foal with her black and white head.   
  
“Ravenstag is a good name,” Richardas agreed with a smile, “and you were a great help, Will.”

Smiling a little, Will was glad to have been helpful, especially to the Lecters. “Thanks for letting me help.”

“She might not have been as calm without you. You’ve definitely got the touch,” the vet said, as he examined the mare, and made sure she was alright.

Beaming with a little pride, Will stood by Hannibal's side, already imagining what the pretty new horse would look like someday. The storm was swelling out, beating rain against the heavy doors, but everyone seemed far more content now. Within only a few minutes, the mother horse stood, and nuzzled Will, as though to thank him, and the baby Ravenstag stood as well, on long, shaky legs, after a few failed attempts. He managed to walk to his mother, and nursed from her, happily.   
  
“Everything looks great, I don’t think I’m needed here,” the vet said, as he packed up. “I’ll come back in a week for a checkup but they both look healthy, call if you need anything,” he told Richardas, who nodded, watching the horses.   
  
The vet stopped by Will, and patted his arm. “You’ve got a touch with horses, son, good job,” he said, and let himself back out, into the storm.   
  
Will shied away from the touch, and eye contact, but nodded at the vet slowly, and then watched him leave. “I wonder if my parents will let me have a horse.”

“They’re a lot of work, but they’re beautiful animals,” Richardas said, watching as his son stood closer to Will when he shied away from the vet’s pat on the arm, protectively. It was adorable to watch Hannibal actually bond to someone besides his sister.

“You can ride ours,” Hannibal said, decisively.

“Until you’re gone,” Will sighed, knowingly, but tried  _ not  _ to think about that bit. They had all summer yet and a school semester.

“That won’t be for a long time,” Hannibal said, with the same tone. He tried not to think about it as well. Maybe they would never move back.

“What will happen to the horses?” Will rubbed at his eyes, and put his glasses, like a shield from the emotions he didn’t want to feel from himself or Hannibal.

“We will move them with us. Our horses in Lithuania are older horses, they would not like to travel as much,” Richardas said and watched as Ravenstag walked over to Will and sniffed at him, blinking. Hannibal reached a hand out and petted the little black creature, with a sad smile.

“We could leave them here, and Will and his family could care for them until we come back,” Hannibal suggested.

That was optimistic, and Will liked the sound of it, of course. “You did say horses don’t move well.”

Richardas seemed to think about that, and looked at the boys where they stood with the newborn foal, then nodded. “I’ll discuss it with your mother, that’s not a terrible idea,” he admitted, as the foal nudged Will, curious about him.

“I’d take good care of ‘em,” Will drawled, looking over Hannibal with a big smile on his face, excited that even if Hannibal left, he’d have a piece of him until he came back. “He would,” Hannibal added, looking up at his father with large eyes, full of hope.

 

Richardas laughed and shook his head, looking away. “Don’t look at me like that, I’ll talk to your mother…” he said, a known pushover for Hannibal’s pleading look, if only because it was so rarely used.

Will smiled at that and took Hannibal’s hand. They should leave the mother and baby to be for now, Will had a feeling they needed it. Richardas looked at the little foal, almost impossible to see in a shadow of the warm stall as it laid down near his mother. “Come on, we should get back to the house. I’m sure you two are hungry?” he asked.   
Will nodded, and tugged Hannibal along as they trudged out into the storm, but by the looks of it, the storm would end soon, just as soon as it came.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) as always, not beta'd and given a once through edit by us  
> 2) Short chapter, but we think it sets the tone.  
> 3)IF you like what you see, please follow us on [TUMBLR!](http://constructfairytales.tumblr.com)

That night while asleep, Will tossed and turned, his little legs kicking the covers off the bed, as he started to sweat right through his summer short pajamas. He panted. Inside his dreams, he saw the baby horse they had helped today, only it was full grown and had wings, just as Will had imagined it might. His dreams were far more realistic than usual, the Ravenstag was pushing him along a windy road, and Will walked and walked, feet sore and growing cold, slippery, and sliding against the ground a few times. Finally, he stopped, the Ravenstag butted his antlers gently against Will’s back, and he took one final step.

“Will?” Hannibal’s voice sounded sleepy as he opened his bedroom door to find his best friend standing there, with his eyes glazed over. 

Will looked like he had walked there, in the middle of the night, followed by Jyn. Will’s feet were muddy, and his skin was red from the cool air outside.   
  
The younger boy hardly moved, staying there, swaying slightly, a distant and far off look in his eyes, blinking and yet not asleep nor awake. Hannibal waved his hand in front of Will’s eyes, and when Will didn’t react, he smiled a little.   
  
“You’re sleepwalking,” he laughed, softly, and guided Will into his room, then closed the door.   
He brought Will to his bed, which was larger than it really needed to be for a nine-year old boy, and helped Will sit on it. “Will? Will? Wake up…”

Knobby knees hit the bed covers and Will’s eyes brightened, but looked confused as he glanced around unfamiliar territory, at least for waking. “Where…” he panted, breath coming quickly through his nose as panic rose through him.

Hannibal touched Will’s shoulder, and smiled at him, his own hair messy for once, in his eyes. “You walked here. You were asleep.”

Will’s eyes focused on Hannibal finally, and he blinked at him curiously. “I walked here? I was sleeping…” He was dreaming about the Ravenstag, but behind him was only Jyn.

“What were you dreaming about?” Hannibal asked, curiously, and watched as Jyn jumped up on the bed behind Will, making herself at home.

“The grown horse, a real Ravenstag though,” Will said, sleepily, dreamlike in his tone, quiet. He didn’t put his feet on the bed, they were wet and muddy from the ground outside.   
  
“Part raven, part … stag?” Hannibal asked, with a little smile, fascinated by Will’s mind. He hopped off his large bed and ran to the dresser, to get his secret book, then came back with it and flipped the pages to the middle. He’d been drawing in it a lot.“Like this?” Hannibal asked, and showed Will a simple, but good sketch of an animal that looked like a stag with feathers. “He’s … these are feathers,” Hannibal explained, pointing around the creature’s neck.

Will nodded slowly, and blinked at the picture, touching it. “Something like that,” he murmured, and set his feet on the ground again, they hurt, but he had to get the mud off.

“I drew it before I went to sleep, I couldn’t stop thinking about it,” Hannibal said, and set the book on the bed, where the pages fluttered, still open. “Are you hurt?”

Will was making a face like he was in pain, somehow.

“Feet hurt,” Will said, and padded off slowly to the bathroom to look at his feet. How he got into Hannibal’s house, he had no idea, but the field was a mess with twigs and mud from the storm. Without being able to feel what he was stepping on, Will had slept-walked through sharp sticks and over rough stones without shoes, and his feet were scratched up and raw.   
  
“Come, sit on the edge of the bathtub,” Hannibal said, steering Will to sit on the wide stone edge as he leaned in and turned the water on, then got a towel and handed it to Will.   
  
“My mother has foot cream, maybe that’s going to help…”

“Foot… cream?” Will asked, still trying to wake up as he sat there, confused and lost, completely dumbstruck. “Just wash ‘em off.”

Hannibal rolled up his own pajama pants and climbed in the tub with a bar of soap, then started to clean Will’s feet off, carefully, picking bits of twigs off of them with his steady fingers, concentrating hard as his messy, dark blond hair fell into his face.   
  
“Thanks,” Will whispered, still sure he was in a dream, and Hannibal was some nice kid who actually liked him, and was helping him. No one helped him.

“You’re bleeding a little bit, wait here,” Hannibal said and climbed out of the tub, then came back ten minutes later with a little bag. “I got it out of my parents bathroom,” he explained, and climbed back in, and used tweezers to take a thorn out of the bottom of Will’s foot, then another. He pursed his lips dramatically as he focused, like a duck.

Will rubbed his sleepy eyes. “Are you a doctor?”

Hannibal laughed at that, and looked up at Will “No. Why, should I be?” he asked, blushing as he picked thorns out of Will’s left foot, then moved to the right.

“You’re helpin’ me.” Will shrugged, slowly coming around, coming to. “Mama was gonna be a nurse.”   
  
“Why didn’t she?” Hannibal asked, innocently as he pulled the biggest sliver out of Will’s foot, and then rinsed them under the running water from the faucet.

Hissing at the pain, Will grimaced. “She had me. Couldn’t finish her schoolin’. Not enough money, dad said.” “That’s too bad,” Hannibal said, and looked up at Will as he rinsed the blood out of the little cut in his foot. “But, I’m glad she had you instead,” he murmured, still blushing a bit, then turned the water off and climbed out. “I’ll make us hot chocolate.”

Will blushed at that and then moved to stand, careful on his feet, moving very slowly after Hannibal. “I don’t like mine too sweet.”

Hannibal nodded and hurried downstairs, quietly. Jyn jumped off the bed and came over to sniff at Will’s feet, then wagged at him and nudged the boy.   
  
A moment later, Hannibal came in with two mugs of hot chocolate, balancing them very, very carefully.   
  
“Here, not too sweet, but very hot,” he whispered, and looked at Will’s feet. “Are they better?”

Will shrugged slim shoulders, and took the cup and sat on the edge of Hannibal’s bed, feet up this time. “Better now.” He was still embarrassed, honestly.

“Have you ever done that before?” Hannibal asked, sitting with Will, their shoulders touching as they sipped their drinks, which were large enough that they had to hold them with both hands.

“I do it sometimes. After stress.” Will looked down into his cup, and then sipped on it carefully, still very hot.

“Those boys stressed you so much you slept walked,” Hannibal said, with a little set of his jaw, and pursed his lips again before he inhaled the scent of his cocoa. “Hm.”

He sipped it.

Will blinked, he’d almost forgotten about the boys with all that had happened. He drank his cocoa and leaned in against Hannibal. “Maybe they did.”

“Then I wish I had done more to them,” Hannibal muttered, frowning into his hot chocolate before he looked at his friend.

Setting his cup down, will hugged Hannibal around the shoulders, resting his forehead against his cheek. “You did enough. You got me out of trouble.”   
  
Hannibal closed his eyes at that, and leaned in against Will smiling a little. “You shouldn’t be in trouble. You punched that boy for touching me. No one’s ever done that,” he murmured, and swallowed a little hard. “It was nice.”   
  
Will yawned, and flopped back on the bed, far more comfortable than his own, and snuggled an arm around Hannibal’s waist. “You’d have done it, even if I didn’t.”

“Yes,” Hannibal admitted with a little laugh, and flopped back into bed too, looking at Will as he balanced his hot chocolate in his hands, carefully. “But it was better that you did it. They didn’t expect that.”

“They should have,” Will said, thoughtfully and curled up around Hannibal, like he would his mama or his father, rubbing his cheek against Hannibal’s shoulder.   
  
Hannibal held Will the way he would have held Mischa, once he set his cocoa aside, and then kicked his blankets over them. “You’re little, but ferocious,” Hannibal smiled, petting Will’s curls.   
  
Will’s mind was tired, his eyes were already closed, and he was sinking into slumber slowly., “Mhm,” he hummed.   
  
“Like a little mongoose,” Hannibal murmured, feeling the same way. His eyes were drooping shut as they snuggled, and he began to dream. “They eat snakes.”   
  
***

Seven that very morning, there was  furious knocking on the door, following by intense sobbing. Charlotte was out looking for Will, as Harvey had left already for work earlier. Will was nowhere to be seen nor found. She could only hope the Lecters had seen him or would help her find him.

A maid answered the door, and let the distraught lady in, then hurried upstairs to get Mrs. Lecter, who came down the staircase, tying a long black dressing gown around her waist.   
  
“What’s happened?” she asked, immediately, going to Charlotte in a hurry.

“I can’t find Will,” Charlotte drawled out through sobs, clenching her apron in her two hands, clearly she had looked everywhere, under everything, with the dogs, out by the swing, and her worst fear being the swamp.

Mrs. Lecter’s jaw set, and she straightened, then went to the window to look at the stables. “There was a foal born last night, the boys were there for it. We’ll see if he’s snuck there and fallen asleep,” she said, then looked at the floor, noting muddy little footprints headed up the stairs, one human, one dog. “One moment…” she said, and turned to the maid then talked in Lithuanian, and motioned for Charlotte to follow her up the stairs. “There was mud this morning on the floor, the maid believed it was from Richardas but he hasn’t been out since last night and it was perfectly clean before we retired last night …”

She opened the door to Hannibal’s bedroom, and there in the bed, snuggled like two birds in a fluffy nest were the sleeping boys. “There,” she nodded, with relief, and guided Charlotte in to see them.   
  
Charlotte followed, worried and concerned, shaking with panic and fear that only quelled when she saw her son, happily asleep with his best friend. “He musta gotten out with his sleepwalkin’ again.”   
  
Mrs. Lecter turned to face Charlotte, and gave a relieved sigh. “Would you like to wake them or shall we have some breakfast … with a mimosa, perhaps?” she offered, smiling a little. Charlotte looked like she could use something to calm her nerves.   
  
The cups of hot chocolate sat almost untouched and cold, a towel lay on the floor by the bathroom, for once, Hannibal’s room almost looked messy. Jyn jumped off of the foot of the bed where she had been sleeping with the boys, and hurried over to Charlotte, wagging at her as she leaned against her legs, almost apologetically.

Charlotte petted Jyn’s head, flustered; “I’m not supposed-- supposed to have alcohol.” They didn’t mix with her medication, the drugs they put her on when the postpartum hit hard, and she’d never gone off them since.

“My apologies,” Mrs. Lecter nodded, keeping her voice low so that the boys did not wake.

“Perhaps a coffee, in that case? We can sit and have something while the boys wake up, and then they can explain their little adventures to us. Does Will sleepwalk often?” Simonetta asked, as they moved closer to the door.   
  
Charlotte nodded at that, allowing herself to be removed from the room so the boys would sleep. “He sleepwalks when he gets stressed.”

“When did he begin that?” Mrs. Lecter asked as they walked to the kitchen, where the house chef looked up, surprised. Mrs. Lecter requested breakfast from him, politely, and waved off his help as she poured them both a coffee from an elaborate device, handing Charlotte’s over to her in a china cup on a fine saucer. “Milk, sugar, or cream?”

“Just sugar,” Charlotte said quietly, and took the saucer, so different than her own at home. She followed Simona into the elegant dining room that was full of sunlight in the morning, and sat down, daintily. “When he was three.”

“Has he ever gone this far before?” Mrs. Lecter asked, and passed the elegant bowl of sugar to Charlotte, then sat opposite her guest, sipping her coffee. 

“He almost made it to the bridge once, but the dogs let us know he was out and got us. Usually they do that.” Charlotte looked down at Jyn who looked down at her with a little frown and upturned brows.

“She must be so accustomed to following him here that she did not think it strange enough to alert you,” Simonetta said, observantly, and looked at Jyn.

“Probably,” Charlotte said quietly, shaking her head and then patted the dog on the head. “At least I know she was with him.”

“I’ll speak to Hannibal, if this happens again, you will know immediately,” Simonetta said, apologetically. “Do you sleepwalk as well?” she asked.

“I used to, but Harvey keeps me in bed now when I try to get up. I might need to start locking Will’s windows, maybe,” Charlotte drawled out and took sip of the coffee that tasted far richer than anything she’d ever made.

“That might be a good idea, even if just at night,” Simonetta said as the chef brought a dish of freshly cut, arranged fruit to them, and she thanked him in Lithuanian as he set small plates before them, with fancy forks. “Are there dangerous animals in the area?”

“There’s a few, Alligators are one of them, but they hardly come up on land often, not around here,” Charlotte explained, looking at the fruit and the dainty fork. “Foxes, coyotes… snakes.”

“Please, have some, it’s an appetizer of sorts,” Simonetta said as she dished a few pieces for herself and handed he serving fork to Charlotte. “Are the snakes venomous?”

Charlotte took a few pieces, not to be greedy, glad it was just the two of them, as too many was a lot to handle in her headspace. “Some of them are, yeah.”

“If there’s anything we can do to help, I’d like to, somehow. Will is an exceptional boy, and I’ve never seen Hannibal so happy. It breaks my heart to think of the day we have to return home,” Simonetta sighed.

“Most boys don’t understand Will, but he understands them just fine. It’s nice to see someone finally understand him back,” Charlotte said, just as a pattering of small feet came down the stairs and lanky arms wrapped around Charlotte tightly.

“Mama,” Will said, head against her shoulder.

“I was worried.”

“Sorry.”

“No, no, don’t be, you can’t help it,” Charlotte said and pulled Will into her lap, caressing his curly hair.

Hannibal followed, looking a little sheepish, dressed in pajamas with a robe over them, tied at the waist. “He was sleepwalking, we fell asleep,” Hannibal explained, the tips of his ears going pink.   
  
“Well, I’m glad he came here and not somewhere else,” Charlotte sighed, holding Will for a moment longer, as if he knew she needed the reassurance he was okay. Finally he wiggled free to stand with Hannibal.

“We are not cross, but if this happens again, Hannibal, you are to call Will’s parents at  _ once _ to let them know Will is here. Miss Charlotte was understandably worried,” Simonetta said to her son, who nodded.   
  
“Of course,” Hannibal nodded and then looked at Charlotte, apologetically. “I was just happy he came here,” Hannibal said, honestly, smiling a little at Will.   
  
“Oh, it’s okay, hon. I just didn’t know where he’d gone is all. It can be very unsafe out there after dark,” Charlotte explained, but smiled at Hannibal, not cross at all.

“We’ll call if it happens again,” Hannibal said, very seriously, and looked at Will. He had slept well, curled up with his friend, and hoped, quietly, that Will would sleepwalk to his place, more often.

“Maybe he could stay the night some nights, during the summer,” Charlotte offered on seeing Will’s hopeful eyes and didn’t need him to beg or ask to know it was riding his mind. “That would be nice,” Hannibal nodded, as he did his best not to look too excited, even though his eyes were glittering at the thought.   
  
“They could spend time with the horses, Will helped last night as one of our mares gave birth,” Mrs. Lecter said and waved her hand to offer the boys a seat at the table as the chef brought out tea and juice.   
  
Will sat down with Hannibal, and took some juice, kicking his feet that barely were able to touch the ground. “It’s really cute mom.”

“The baby horse?” Charlotte asked. Will nodded, and his mother smiled at him, and ruffled his hair. “I think it’d be good for ya to spend a little more time here maybe.”

Hannibal sipped his juice and nodded in agreement at Will as he took another sip. “You might be going to school here, after all..” he said, wiggling his feet in excitement at the idea of that.

“It’s been approved for the semester,” Charlotte said, sipping her coffee now, the fruit on her plate now gone.

Will looked up, excited, blue eyes big. “Really?” His mother nodded.

Hannibal looked his age for a moment, wide-eyed and smiling. He hugged Will, impulsively, at the breakfast table.   
  
“You’re going to love it!” he promised, excited to the point of breathlessness.

Anything that had nothing to do with the kids at school Will knew he would love. He hugged Hannibal back hard, and Charlotte chuckled.  “You two act like you’re goin’ off to a theme park.”

“This is much better than a theme park,” Hannibal assured her, as the chef served them all a lovely breakfast with eggs, croissants, crisp bacon and an arrangement of greens to make it look tied together.

Will leaned over and smelled the food first, and Charlotte watched how happy he was, how less awkward he seemed with a friend, and did not look forward to the day it would all be taken from him. Will took the bacon first and munch on it happily.

Mrs. Lecter watched the boys with the same expression, then looked at Charlotte. “Bon Appetit, best to enjoy it warm, while you can.”   



	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Not beta'd, but lightly edited by us.  
> 2) We're not crying, you're crying. Fair warning.  
> 3) Like what you see? Follow us on [TUMBLR](http://constructfairytales.tumblr.com)

Months passed, Will and Hannibal got through summer, playing in the grass, annoying alligators, getting dirty when it rained, and letting Mischa annoy them just a little. When September hit the weather started to change, the boys started up school, tutoring with the teacher that Hannibal’s mother brought in. Will ended up liking it a lot more than regular school, learning faster, and enjoying it for once, rather than planning out the day, and when he could go home.

Halloween came and went, and Will showed Hannibal all the fun of dressing up, as they both went as wolves. Will’s mother helped them with their costumes, and Mischa was a little lamb. No one knew who they were, and when they got home they ate themselves sick in candy.

By December, the Grahams had shared their Thanksgiving traditions with Lecters, and Christmas was just around the corner. After that was the when the Lecters were due to move, just after the first of the next year. The house was already being packed up, and Will stood there by Hannibal’s Christmas tree, helping decorate it, but he couldn’t help  the dread that came with knowing his best friend would be gone soon.

“Do you really have to leave?”

Hannibal hung a delicate, crystal deer on a branch of the largest tree in the living room, and bit the inside of his cheek. “My parents say we do, I’ve asked, many times,” he murmured, and looked over at Will.

They spent everyday together since they met, and Will was starting to get anxious about going back to real school, with dealing with the other kids, the bullying boys, and the teachers. Most of all, he was anxious about losing his friend. He didn’t even know if he’d ever come back. Will sighed heavily and put a snowflake on the tree. “I wish I could go with you, but mama would be real sad.”  
  
“I asked about that too,” Hannibal nodded, and watched Will with a heavy sigh. “I asked if I could stay, too.”

“You’ll write me, yeah?” Will asked, throwing tinsel on the tree now, in globs, mostly because he was trying not to be upset over the idea of losing everything good at once.

Hannibal just laughed at the question, and looked at Will, like that was silly to ask. “I would still write to you if I was in _prison_ ,” he said, smiling a little bit.

Will rolled his eyes. “You’d never go to prison.” He stuck his tongue out at Hannibal and tossed tinsel at his face.

Hannibal smiled at that, and side stepped the flying tinsel to hang a red, Chinese dragon on the tree, an exotic ornament Uncle Robertas had brought back from a trip. “Maybe not, but it’s still true.”  
  
Hannibal had a talent for avoiding trouble. The boys that had bothered Will had actually been made to come apologize to them in person after Mrs. Lecter’s lawyers paid their parents a visit, months ago.   
  
Will just didn’t see Hannibal as the prison type, too posh to survive something like that, and he’d get out of it anyway, Will was pretty sure. Not that Hannibal ever did anything _wrong_. “I’ll work on my hand writing some more so you can read my letters back.”

Hannibal laughed at that, and nodded, then handed Will an ornament. “Even if I can’t read them, I’d like them,” he said, honestly. The thought of being away from Will for … he didn’t know how long, was terrible.

Will took the elegant glass blown red and blue ornament and set it on the tree that smelled like fresh pine. Outside, a light layer of frost was on the ground.  The weather had changed dramatically over the last five months, and now they were in sweaters and long pants. “Do your parents think you can come visit at least again?”

“Next summer,” Hannibal said, with a nod, and looked around the house. “I’m trying to memorize it all, keep it in my mind.”

Will had no trouble with that, he kept a very good snapshot of Hannibal in his mind. He had a horrible feeling after the end of the month, he might not see his friend for a long, long time.

Mischa hurried into the room, running to dig through the box of christmas ornaments with a giggle. “Firefly! Firefly!” she said, and pulled out a box of what looked like gold fireflies, then gave them to Hannibal to open.

“Alright, we can put them on now,” Hannibal said, and opened the box for his little sister, handing her one.  
  
Mischa, on many nights while it was warm, sat with Will and Hannibal and watched fireflies outside. It had been their ritual until it became too cold for the glowing bugs.

Will laughed and helped her with one of them, putting it on the tree. “Do you have fireflies back home?” he asked, trying to paint a picture in his mind of what Lithuania was like.

“Many of them,” Hannibal chuckled and helped to clip the delicate little bugs onto the tree, then flicked a little switch near their tails, one by one, making them glow.

“Firefly, Will!” Mischa insisted, and gave hers to Will to clip on the tree.

Will put that one, too, on the tree, watching it light up. Hannibal’s side was perfect, Will’s was a little sloppy, and eclectic looking, but he shrugged. They didn’t have a large tree at his house, just small one by the window that took five minutes to decorate. “I hope to see them someday.”

“I’m sure you will,” Hannibal said, watching Will as his face was illuminated by the glow of the tree. 

Mischa applauded, with a big smile, and ran around the tree to look at her fireflies, delighted.  
  
“You’d like our land back home, it’s so big. We have wolves, deer, you could fish in the rivers and ponds,” Hannibal said, wistfully.

Will’s parents would never allow it, too far from home without them, and the money it would cost would be more than Will would ever take from them. He slipped his arm around Hannibal to hug him, the most he’d ever hugged one person outside of his parents. “Someday maybe.”

“When we’re older, my mother said you’re very welcome. Until then, I’ll come back every summer,” Hannibal promised, and leaned into Will’s hug. Will made him feel understood, befriended. It wasn’t something he’d ever felt before, and Hannibal was dreading the day he had to leave, even for a few months.

“Maybe we could hide you in my closet,” Will whispered with a little smile, trying to break the tension between them that was there, settling over them like a dark cloud.

Hannibal laughed, and hugged Will back with a heavy sigh when the laugh died down. “I would do that, I would live in your closet and live on gumbo if I could stay,” he said.

“Maybe you should. Your parents still have Mischa,” Will whispered, so Hannibal’s sister wouldn’t hear him.

Hannibal laughed again, his cheeks becoming rounded and beautifully defined as he did that. “I’ll make a robot to take my place, no one will know,” he whispered.

Will smiled brightly at that, and flopped down on the couch with a big sigh, and tugged Hannibal with him. “Do you think that would work?”

Hannibal curled up with Will, and rested his head on Will’s head, cheek against his hair. “We could run away to Italy.”  
  
It was silly to talk like this, because they were children, really, they couldn’t do anything, but Will treasured the thought anyway. “And eat lotsa pasta.”

Hannibal giggled, something he didn’t do often, and looked at Will up close. “You’d like Italy. It’s so beautiful. It’s warm all the time, the food is so good, everything looks like a painting.”

“If you’re there, I’ll go,” Will said, quietly, chin rested against Hannibal’s shoulder. They’d become very close, the best of friends. Will knew nothing would be the same when Hannibal was gone.

Hannibal knew they were closer than other boys he’d seen let themselves get. They were happiest curled around one another, like puppies, warm and happy, and comfortable being close. He wasn’t sure what it meant, but he knew he was going to be miserable without being able to see Will every day, no matter how many letters they wrote. “What do you want for Christmas?”

What Will wanted to say was ‘for you to stay’ but he didn’t say it, instead he sighed heavily, his little frame rocking with it. “I dunno. What do you want?”

Likewise, Hannibal almost said ‘to stay’. He swallowed it down and shrugged his thin shoulders. “I usually know, but I don’t this year.”  
  
“A nice set of pencils to sketch with?” Will asked, but he knew Hannibal probably got almost anything he needed or wanted. He’d have to think of something special.

“That would be nice. I’d send you everything I drew with them,” Hannibal promised, and buried his nose against Will’s curls as Mischa decorated herself with things from the Christmas box, and spun around, showing them.

Will smiled at Mischa, and pushed Hannibal to lie down, and then snuggled up against him, mostly on him. “I’d like that.”

Hannibal let Will push him, happily, and wrapped his arms around him in a hug as they watched Mischa sing and dance around, covered in tinsel. “Yours will be a surprise,” Hannibal whispered.

Will rolled his eyes at that, and nuzzled his nose against Hannibal’s neck, resting his head there. Hannibal always smelled really nice, and Will liked that, even if it was just whatever soap his parents bought. “Surprise?”

“Yes, I’ll give it to you on Christmas day,” Hannibal promised, aware that Will liked to smell him. It was adorable in the same way that a puppy trying to smell him was adorable.

Will used soap that smelled like soap, but Hannibal always seemed to smell like a bunch of stuff and it intrigued Will. Plus, he liked being close, it made him feel warm from the inside out. “No hints?”

“It’s something you might like while we’re away,” Hannibal hinted, and smiled at Will. He loved the way Will smelled. He smelled like plain soap, and clean cotton, and something else Hannibal didn’t know, except just as … Will.

  
“I can’t wait then,” Will said, as a gift from Hannibal would be amazing, as anything from Hannibal would be.

***

Christmas came too quickly. After the services Hannibal’s mother took the family to, Hannibal hurried over to Will’s house, and knocked on his door, waiting. The Grahams had gone to church the night before and were all in their robes and pajamas still, eating cinnamon rolls that Charlotte made when Hannibal knocked. Will ran to the door.

He tugged the older boy into the house and hugged him tightly.  
  
Hannibal smiled, and hugged Will back, then looked at him. “Happy Christmas,” he said, as though he’d been waiting all day to say that to him.

Will’s blue eyes lit up, and then he let go to go get Hannibal his gift, wrapped still under the tree. “Ready?”

“Ready,” Hannibal nodded, a little nervously. He didn’t show it easily, but he was breathing a little faster, his dark eyes watching Will very closely for any sign of displeasure, even before he gave the gift.

Will handed Hannibal his gift, it was just as he said it was going to be, but the box the pencils were in was hand carved by Will, and Hannibal’s name was burned into it.  
  
Hannibal took the box, and smiled, then ran his fingers over the little dents in the wood in Will’s writing. He opened it, even if he knew what was inside, and looked. Pencils, not the cheapest, the nicest Will’s family could afford. “Thank you,” Hannibal murmured, sincerely, and put the lid back on the box very, very carefully, as though it was a priceless treasure. “I love them.”   
  
Hannibal felt himself blush up to his forehead under the lack of summer tan. His skin still held more color than Will’s, but not as much now, in the Winter months. He pulled a little gift out of his pocket, and handed it to Will. It was a key, wrapped in black paper with a little gold ribbon and a tag with Will’s name on it. Hannibal had written it as nicely as he possibly could. “It’s to the stables. They’re yours, so are the horses. You can have them, and maybe let me ride them when I come back.”   
  
Will unwrapped the key and looked at it, awestruck that Hannibal would _give_ them to him, he just thought he’d be taking care of them. Will bit his lip almost hard enough to bleed, and then hugged Hannibal tightly. “I’ll take real good care of ‘em.”   
  
Hannibal held Will to him, and swallowed tightly as he squeezed Will close to him.   
  
“I know you will. Ravenstag loves you. We couldn’t let anyone else take care of them. Mother said to make sure you want them, but I told her I knew you would,” Hannibal whispered.   
  
“I do,” Will agreed, nodding, actually tearing up a little as he squeezed Hannibal. Christmas meant they only had a week left, if that.   
  
A week, and not a day more.   
  
Hannibal rested his head on Will’s shoulder for a long moment, then pressed his nose against the side of his neck, against the velvety soft skin there. “Will you let me draw you?” Hannibal asked, finally.   
  
It felt like watching someone die, slowly.   
  
Usually Will was very self conscious about people watching him, let alone drawing him, but he nodded. “Now?” Behind him his parents were quietly reading the paper and drinking their coffee, giving the boys their own space.

Hannibal nodded, and looked at the little box of pencils again with a smile. “I want to try them out,” he murmured, and looked up at Will again, hoping Will would not guess that he’d sketched Will already, dozens of times.

Will tugged on Hannibal’s arm, and grabbed a pad of paper from the counter he was going to give Hannibal too. “C’mon, we can go to my room.”  
  
Hannibal nodded, and looked at the pad of paper with a dark-eyed smile, then followed Will. He wished Mr. and Mrs. Graham Happy Christmas on the way past, and sat on Will’s narrow, rather pokey bed with his presents, smiling at them again.   
  
“Come, sit here…” Hannibal instructed.   
  
Will sat down next to Hannibal, key still gripped tight in one fist, and wiped at his eyes before blinking blue at Hannibal. “Here?”   
  
Hannibal reached up and turned Will’s face to look at him, then spotted the wetness in his eyes. “We’ll write,” he began to promise, again, as though convincing both of them.   
  
“It won’t be the same. Where will I go when I sleepwalk?” Will asked, having done it more often than not these last few months. “Who will I talk to?”

Hannibal felt his own eyes wet over, and his throat tightened at the thought of Will sleepwalking to an empty house. He moved closer to Will, and set his pencils and paper aside to hug him again. They only had a week left, and then Will would have no one. Hannibal would not have Will.

“We’ll talk to each other, on paper, as often as we can, and then I’ll come back next summer and we can do this again, like I’ve never left,” Hannibal promised.

Will nodded, hugging Hannibal tightly, shaking a little as he nuzzled his face against his neck, trying not to cry too much more. He didn’t want to ruin Hannibal’s sketch. “I know. Just until summer.”

Hannibal pulled Will into the tiny bed and held him there, both of their heads on Will’s pillow, leaving their scents there, something to remember them by.  
  
“I’ll be back, as soon as I can. I promise,” Hannibal whispered, hugging Will as tightly as he could. The connection they felt was deep, and primordial, as instinctive as two puppies from the same litter huddled together for warmth.

Will curled in against Hannibal as he always did, and gazed at him. “I will miss you.” He leaned in and kissed Hannibal’s cheek softly. He didn’t want to think about going back to school, he just wanted summer to come now.

Hannibal’s cheek blushed under Will’s lips, and he kicked the neat little quilt folded at the end of Will’s bed over them both, cocooning them like a chrysalis, like they were waiting to become something bigger together.  
  
“I’ll miss you too,” Hannibal admitted softly, staring back at Will. He could still feel the tingling mark on his cheek where Will kissed him. He hoped it never faded, ever.   
  
***

January first came, and the Lecters were packed up to leave. Will was on the front stoop of their house, bundled up, sniffling, and trying not to cry.

Hannibal had been up in his room, sitting on the bed that was draped in a dust cover. For the first time since they met, he didn’t want to go see Will. If he saw him, he had to say goodbye, if he said goodbye, he had to leave.

Richardas appeared in Hannibal’s doorway and gave him a sympathetic look. “We must go,” he said, and stepped in to coax his son out. Hannibal stood, stiffly, not looking at his father, and walked out on legs that felt like they did not belong to him. Hemade his way down the stairs, able to see Will’s familiar silhouette through the frosted glass of the door.  
  
Finally, he made himself open the door, and step outside. His eyes flashed wet, immediately, and he wrapped his arms around Will, tightly, holding on wordlessly, heart-broken.   
  
“Please don’t go,” Will whispered, small arms tight around Hannibal, trying his best to stay close, to hold him as long as possible, but Will’s parents were just feet away, ready to pull him back if they had to.   
  
Hannibal took a ragged breath in, and clutched Will tightly, shaking in his arms. “I don’t want to,” he whispered back, and pulled an envelope out of his pocket with Will’s name on it, then put it in Will’s pocket for him, and hugged him again. “I’ll write the second I am home. I’ll write on the plane,” he whispered, his voice wavering.

Will didn’t touched the envelope, but he did look at Hannibal, a dread washing over him, something would keep them apart, he just knew it. “Okay. I can’t wait to read it.”

Hannibal cupped the back of Will’s head with one hand, and kissed both his cheeks, then hugged him again, tightly. “I’ve told your Ravenstag to look after you.”

Being the sort of person he was, Will tried hard not to feel all of Hannibal’s emotions with his own. He choked down the sobs, and nodded. “Okay, okay. I’ll look after him too.”

“I’ll be back, as soon as I can,” Hannibal whispered. His mother touched Hannibal’s shoulder, gently.

“We have to go, Hannibal,” she murmured, and Hannibal nodded, then looked at Will again, and wiped his face with one hand, crying openly for the first time since he was Mischa’s age.  
  
“I’ll see you soon, Will,” he whispered, shaken.

Will felt like he was about to crawl out of his skin, shaking, but his mother wrapped her arms around him, holding him as the Lecters left, to an awaiting car to take them back home.

“Hannibal!” Will cried out and finally Harvey just picked the boy up and carried him back home.

Hannibal’s throat squeezed hard at the way Will said his name and was pulled away from him like that, but managed to stay mostly still as his mother took his hand, and guided him to the waiting car, ushering him into it.

He stole a blurry look back at Will before he door closed, dark glass hiding him as the car pulled away, everyone else long since having said their goodbyes.  
  
Will buried his face in his father’s chest, openly crying. They took him home, where Will didn’t speak to anyone for weeks.

In the letter Hannibal had given Will was a key he’d stolen to the house itself and a short note.

_Dear Will,_

_I will write you soon, please don’t be too sad. My book is in it’s usual place. Come stay in my room sometimes, and add whatever you think is beautiful to it. We’ll look at it together when I return._ _  
_ _  
_ _I know I already miss you._ _  
_   
Love, Hannibal

***

Will hid away in the Lecter’s house often after taking care of the horses. After school and on weekends, he settled into Hannibal's room until dinner and then went home and ate, then bed with the dogs, more now with the pups growing fast.

Charlotte worried, of course, but she also learned she was pregnant around this time too, and her moods shifted, and she could hardly handle Will and herself.

Two months in, Charlotte miscarried, and her moods plummeted completely and Will and his father were forced to figure out what to do. Will only had time now to feed and groom the horses and then go home to help his mom, who fell into a depression and would do nothing.

Will never wrote Hannibal about that, he didn't want him to know.

As promised, Hannibal began to write to Will the moment they were on the plane to Europe, and mailed his first letter from Paris, sneaking away from his parents to do so. More letters followed, short, but conversational, and often accompanied by a sketch of something Hannibal wrote about.  
  
_Dear Will,_ _  
_ _  
_ _We’re back at home now. It is hard to believe I didn’t want to go to America last year. My room in the castle is very quiet when Mischa is not visiting me. I know you would like to explore the castle with me, especially the mazes under the wine cellar that I’m certain not even my parents know exist._ _  
_ _  
_ _I’ll save them for us to visit together when you are able to come here, someday._ _  
_ _  
_ _Things are very dull without you. I feel like an alien again, visiting a planet I do not belong to. At least with you, we were both aliens._ _  
_ _  
_ _Here is a map to the mazes, I drew it myself._ _  
_   
Love, Hannibal.   
  
Will often wrote back about school, never his parents. Things didn’t change, people still treated him differently, and Will was learning to navigate it all the more differently.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_The horses are fine, I brush them every day. I think they miss you, not as much as me though. School is harder to get through now. They pulled me from the special class. I now sit with everyone else._

_I wish I could run away._

_Love, Will_

Letters passed like this for months and months. Will’s mother didn’t get much better, and Will quickly learned to take care of her instead, and his dad worked longer hours at the shipyards. Soon, Will was a quiet, anti-social sort, writing letters to Hannibal everyday, even if he never sent half of them. Instead, he tucked them away in Hannibal’s drawing book, hidden now in his own dresser, afraid to lose it.

Hannibal kept every single letter of Will’s, very carefully, and began to count down the days until they would return to America, to Will. 

And then, everything changed with one terrible evening.  
  
_Dear Will,_ _  
_   
There’s been an accident. My parents were heading into Vilnius, and their car was hit.

_I’ve been told that they have died. My uncle Robertas is on his way. Police are here. Mischa is crying. None of this seems real. Please tell me this is not real. If I send this letter to you, and you write back like we always do, maybe this is not real._

_A policeman said I’m in shock. I don’t know what that means._

_I think perhaps I’m having a bad dream. Perhaps I’m sleepwalking, like you do. I cannot wait to wake up._

_Love, Hannibal_

All Will could think was how he could not be there to be with Hannibal through it, and all the while his own parents were distant, his father worked late and drank when he came home, and his mother hardly seemed alive anymore. Any chance of getting to Hannibal was out of the question.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_Sorry to hear about your parents. I wish I could be there. Maybe your uncle can send you here for the summer and we can pretend everything is okay for a while._

_The horses miss you._

_I miss you most._

_Love, Will._

Hannibal’s next letter came immediately, almost sent before Will’s reached his.

_Dear Will,_

_My Uncle and his wife are here. Them being here makes it more real. My parents are not simply away in the city for an evening, they are gone._

_I do not remember the funeral. I know we were there, but I went to America in my mind._ _  
_ _  
_ _Mischa is inconsolable, with me all the time. If it were not for her, I would leave no matter what my uncle says and come see you. She’s so small, and so heart-broken._ _  
_ _  
_ _My Uncle’s wife is concerned about me, I don’t cry in front of them. I think that alarms her. I do not cry in front of Mischa, either. I have to be her father, now._ _  
_ _  
_ _I miss you, even more now. Please write back quickly._ _  
_   
Love,

_Hannibal_

As Will’s life unraveled and he became more reclusive than ever, he found himself just wishing he could fix Hannibal's life for him.  He didn’t mention his mother’s illness or his father he hadn’t really seen in weeks now, though he was sure he still lived with them.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_I’d let you cry in front of me. I know you would. I wish I could get to you, or you to me. Hug Mischa for me and write back soon. Summer is coming quickly._

_Love, Will_

Hannibal read his letters in his room, every one of them, rushing up to the room with Mischa always attached to him now to open them.  
  
_Dear Will,_

_My Uncle, who is now our legal guardian, has said that if we leave the country, he fears other family members will try to take my parents’ castle by inhabiting it and paying lawyers to make them unevictable._

_I may be late, and the thought makes me somehow more upset than I can ever remember being. Everything is so heavy._ _  
_ _  
_ _Mischa is constantly attached to me now, she refuses to speak to anyone but me, she refuses to listen to anyone but me. If she were not so in need of me, I would come at once, somehow._ _  
_ _  
_ _I miss you, terribly. I wish we were still at the mansion. All of us, but especially you and I, I know that is selfish._ _  
_   
Love,

_Hannibal_

Reading the letter, Will knew that Hannibal would not be coming any time soon at all. It took him days to bring up the courage to even write anything back, too depressed to do much other than feed the horses and his chores.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_That’s okay. They need you. We’re all fine here. At least summer is coming and I won’t be in school._

_Love, Will_

Hannibal was functioning, but with the gravitas of an old man inside a child’s body. He wrote to Will late at night, when Mischa was asleep, curled up in the bed he barely used himself anymore. He was a Count now, and he felt old enough for it. 

Sketches of Will were hidden in a leather folder locked in his desk. He did one of them, almost every day, and the thought of not being able to return in a few months made Hannibal’s curious, bright spirit dim and shrivel inside, leaving something darker in it’s place.  
  
_Dear Will,_ _  
_ _  
_ _I’ve argued with my Uncle. We are not getting on very well. I feel as though I am drowning all the time, in dark water that’s rising over my head._ _  
_ _  
_ _I go to the mansion, in my mind. I’ve built it there, and I can visit memories of your dogs, of the horses, of you, the swamp … I’ve been living there, more and more. I need to live there if I cannot come as soon as I thought I could._ _  
_ _  
_ _Home does not feel like a home, but I am doing as well as I can, for Mischa. She says hello, she misses you too, but not as much as I do._ _  
_ _  
_ _Please give Ravenstag sugar cubes for me, apologize to him for me for not being able to come. Apologize to yourself from me, as well. I am beginning to detest Lithuania._ _  
_   
Love, Hannibal

Will didn’t get around to writing for a bit. His mother fell ill, mentally not there, and not taking care of herself, and Will’s father wasn’t sure how to deal with it either. Will’s birthday was spent cleaning blood and vomit off the bathroom floor from his mother. That night, he did write though, but he didn’t tell Hannibal any of that.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_I wish I could go there with you, at least then we’d be together. I’m sorry Mischa is taking it so hard. I bet it’s tough._

_Ravenstag is nearly full grown now. I ride them when I can, which isn’t often these days. It’s hot here, the fireflies have come out._

_Love, Will_

The delay in Will’s response felt enormous to Hannibal’s keen mind. Every day he checked for a letter, and for every day that there was no reply, he felt himself slide a little into the darkness that was beginning to flood his mind.   
  
He waited before replying as well, writing and discarding draft after draft. The last letter had not been good enough. Something about it had clearly angered Will.   
  
Perhaps he had a new friend.   
  
Eighteen drafts later, Hannibal finally put a letter in an envelope, sealed it, and sent it off. His writing was neater than usual, almost calligraphic.   
  
_Dear Will,_

_I wish I could see Ravenstag. I’m sure he is beautiful._

_If you can come here, I am happy to give you a ticket. You are on summer holidays, after all. Your presence would brighten the dull castle, and Mischa would be overjoyed to see you._ _  
_ _  
_ _Fireflies are the only things that make her smile anymore._ _  
_   
Love, Hannibal

Will’s reply was a tear stained one, sent very soon after getting Hannibal’s letter.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_My mama died last week. I’m helping my dad with preparation for the funeral. She was really sick, and unhappy._

_I wish I could come, but dad says he needs me right now, like Mischa needs you._

_I need you._

_Love, Will._

Hannibal read Will’s last letter four times, and woke Mischa, then dressed her, and snuck into his uncle’s bedroom to take his wallet.  
  
He knew how to drive, or rather, he taught himself on the way to the airport. It was hardly that difficult, and he was getting tall enough that he could see over the dash.   
  
Around 4 am, Hannibal and Mischa were stopped in Paris by the police, after Robertas Lecter put out a desperate alert for his presumably kidnapped niece and nephew.   
  
_Dear Will._ _  
_ _  
_ _I am in Paris._ _  
_ _  
_ _Mischa and I did our best to come to you. We were one flight away when we were caught by the police, who made such a fuss over our having managed to get so far by ourselves. They must think us idiots. I told them that I had to be in America, but they would not listen to me, no matter how many times I told them._ _  
_ _  
_ _I did not know your mother was ill. Miss Charlotte was a beautiful, kind lady, and I’m so sorry._ _  
_ _  
_ _I will try again, I promise._ _  
_   
All the love in the world,

_Hannibal_

Will mostly turned in on himself, and dragged through the summer, with the horses and keeping house for his dad, but it wasn’t the same. His father came home, he drank, he slept, he worked. Will took care of himself.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_Thank you for trying._

_Mama had depression really bad, Dad said. She couldn’t take it anymore after she had a miscarriage._

_We weren’t enough._

_I miss you._

_Love, Will_

Hannibal was taken back to Lithuania, lectured, grounded, and now kept under the very, very watchful eye of his uncle, aunt, and a team of bodyguards hired to keep the young Count in place.

Hannibal resented it as he grew taller and stronger with every passing day. He read, and reread Will’s letters, and refused to speak to his uncle more than “hello”, “yes”, “no”, “thank you”.  
  
Mischa stayed closer to Hannibal than ever, clinging to him as all she had left.   
  
_Dear Will,_ _  
_ _  
_ _You are enough. You are enough for me to flee my home with only my sister and a stolen card, just the hope of seeing you is enough._ _  
_ _  
_ _I do not have the legal right to my inheritance right now, or I would be there in an instant._ _  
_ _  
_ _I am sending you something, however, I hope it is enough to make you smile, even once._ _  
_ _  
_ _Your mother adored you. I am very sorry she was ill. The illness finished her, not you._ _  
_ _  
_ _Love, Hannibal_ _  
_ _  
_ _P.s. A present will arrive. I’ll argue with my selfish uncle about it later._   
  
A day after the letter arrived, a fuzzy puppy was delivered to Will’s door with an alarmingly  generous amount of dog food for Will’s old and new dogs.   
  
His name was Winston, and he was a golden retriever cross who had recently lost his mother, just like Will.

Will hugged the puppy so tightly he didn’t even let go when his father asked where it had come from. The other dogs were given away, as Harvey thought it was too much for them to handle without his mother. But Will was not letting go of this one.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_Thank you. We had to gave the other dogs away. He’s great. I wish you could see him. I know your birthday is coming, but I haven’t money to send you anything._

_I miss you, I love you._

_-Will_

Hannibal closed his eyes after reading Will’s latest letter, every time, as though it was too sweet to bear. He kissed the paper, and put it in the growing file of Will’s things, hidden away in his desk.

 _Dearest Will,_ _  
_ _  
_ _I’m glad that you like Winston. I called a shelter, I know you prefer dogs who need a home, and asked if they had anyone who had just lost a mother. My voice is becoming deeper, and I can sound like a grown up when I need to over the phone, it’s very handy._ _  
_ _  
_ _I hope you can comfort one another._ _  
_ _  
_ _All I want for my birthday is a letter from you, perhaps a drawing, or a photo._ _  
_ _  
_ _I miss you, I adore you beyond all reason,_ _  
_   
Hannibal

Will managed to find the old Polaroid, and some film, and set it up on a timer, and had a snapshot done. He sent it along with a baking mix for beneigns to Hannibal with the letter near his birthday.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_Winston goes everywhere with me for now._

_Here is a photo._

_Love, Will_

Seeing Will again was a shock. The warm bloom that it set off in Hannibal’s chest was a surprise when he pulled the photo out of the envelope, as was how handsome Will had become in a few months. 

His face was becoming a little more grown up already, his eyes still as big and blue as Hannibal could remember. Hannibal kept the photo in his jacket at all times, as close to him as possible.  
  
_Dear Will,_ _  
_ _  
_ _Thank you for the photo, and your letter. I know things are not easy, but you look well. Thank you, also, for the baking mix. Mischa and I will make the pastries tonight, and enjoy them together, secretly._ _  
_ _  
_ _I think of you often, I dream of you, too._ _  
_ _  
_ _Mischa has begun to wander, which reminds me of your sleepwalking. I have to keep a very close eye on her these days. I wish you were here to help me do that, she is very troublesome._ _  
_ _  
_ _Enclosed is a photo I’ve taken, quid pro quo._ _  
_   
Love, Hannibal

Will ripped the envelope open when it came and he looked over the picture, never sure that Hannibal was real at all until he saw it again. He’d gotten much taller, more defined. Handsome. Will had already guessed he was different from most boys, who liked girls, but the pictures definitely set off feelings that confirmed that. He kept it in his jacket pocket and when he was not wearing a jacket, he kept it in Hannibal’s drawing book.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_You’ve gotten tall._

_Sorry Mischa is having trouble. Maybe a leash? I’m kidding._

_School starts again soon. I don’t know if I can do it. Dad says we might move. He’s got jobs up the river and I can’t stay by myself. The house staff at your mansion said they would look after the horses._

_Love, Will_

Hannibal smiled at the comment about his height, and knew/suspected that tall meant handsome.

 _Dear Will,_ _  
_ _  
_ _I understand if you have to move, life is difficult, do as you must._ _  
_ _  
_ _Please do not stop writing to me. Let me know where I may write back to you, the thought of losing touch with you is unbearable._ _  
_   
The mansion will always be there, you are always welcome to stay in it, whenever you need to, and I will be here, waiting for your next letter, of course.

_You’ve gotten tall as well._

_Love, Hannibal_

Will and his father owned the boat they lived on, up and down the river, the house was sold. When back in New Orleans, he stayed at the mansion, and had his mail delivered there. It meant that he only got his letters once a month now, and Will was miserable. He went to a school in another state, at least, where he could start over.

The next letter went out two months later.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_Sorry it’s late. School started. You can write me at your old address and I’ll get it once a month. We don’t have an address otherwise. We live on a boat. Me, dad, and Winston. I hope you’re well. I started a new school._

_Love, Will_

***

Years passed, and Hannibal wrote to Will every month. His letters became more elegantly penned, longer, and full of his thoughts and worries. He received each of Will’s letters eagerly, and read them after dark as they grew up, apart from one another. 

After Hannibal’s (repeated) attempts to run away, to get to Will with Mischa, Robertas never allowed travel for either of them. It was not until his eighteenth birthday that Hannibal, now nearly permitted to take on his inheritance in its entirety, would be allowed to move about the world as he wanted to.  
  
_Dear Will,_ _  
_ _  
_ _Another week, and I will finally be of age. Another week, and my Uncle can no longer limit my travel or my associations, and Mischa and I will be free to find you._ _  
_ _  
_ _Studies are going well, my heart is set on medical school. Johns Hopkins in Baltimore is rumored to be the best in your country. I’ve submitted my anatomical sketches with a scholarship application in the hopes that something will come of that. Even if I have the fortune to fund an education, winning a scholarship is a far more satisfying feeling._ _  
_ _  
_ _Schools are full of the wealthy idle and idiotic, I’d rather prove I’m neither of those._ _  
_   
Mischa will come with me, of course. I am speaking to lawyers all this week and the next about taking steps to bring her to America with me on a semi-permanent basis.

_She still speaks of you, and the dogs._

_How is Winston?_ _  
_ _  
_ _I hope your dreams are pleasant, and I hope that I will finally be able to speak to you again in person, sooner rather than later._ _  
_ _  
_ _Love, always,_ _  
_ _\- Hannibal_   
  
A gangly teenager, just turned seventeen, Will picked up his mail, already looking for college acceptance, as he worked his ass off in school to drown out the sorrows of everything else. He got a few acceptance letters, some up in the East Coast area. And as he read Hannibal’s letter, that seemed to be where he wanted to go, too. It might just work out if Will could get his father to let him go early the way he planned.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_I’ve gotten some scholarships for school out East, specifically George Washington University. We’d be closer than we are now. My father is letting me go early, as I’ve finished high school this year, a year early._

_I hope Mischa is well, Winston hopes to meet you both soon. I looked in on the horses, the older ones are getting up there in age._

_Love, Will_

Hannibal read Will’s latest letter, and sat down late at night to pen one in return.

_Dear Will,_

He happened to look out of his window, and among the fireflies saw his sister. She was out again, when she should be sleeping, holding her hand out to try to charm one of the glowing bugs into landing in her palm.

Hannibal stood at the window watching her with a little smile, and debated how to tell her that soon she might see fireflies on the other side of the ocean again when he noticed a dark shape behind Mischa. One she didn’t see.  
  
She was gone.   
  
He bolted from his place at the window, and raced outside.   
  
“MISCHA?”

It was too late.  
  
Hannibal’s next letter was sent as he had begun it. Only “Dear Will,” at the top, and a long line of ink from where he had knocked his pen over the paper as he hurried past his desk to get to Mischa in time.   
  
Inside was a single item, no more words: a tiny, golden firefly ornament.   
  
When Will received and opened the letter, he let the ornament fall into his hand, and dread overcame him quickly. There was nothing else he could take from it but the worst, as Mischa was known to wander. Will tucked the thing into his pocket.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_Please write again soon. I leave for school in the fall, my father had legally let me go. Please let me know you are okay. My sincerest apologies about Mischa._

_Love Always, Will_

The next letter from Lithuania that Will received was not from Hannibal.

 _Dear Mr. Graham,_ _  
_ _  
_ _It’s come to my attention that you are a close friend and correspondent of Hannibal’s._ _  
_ _  
_ _I am not sure that you know, but Mischa has died an untimely death. In the wake of the tragedy, Hannibal has left the country. We are all concerned about his state of mind. Should you hear from him, please write back and let us know._ _  
_ _  
_ _Regards,_ _  
_   
Robertas Lecter

Hannibal did not write again, not for another month. Will received another envelope, this one from Italy, with a return address in Florence.

Inside was a drawing, a sketch of a Botticelli painting, no words to accompany it, as though Hannibal had gone mute as a swan.

Will moved once again, the letter was forwarded to him, at his apartment he could barely afford. He sent a letter back, not sure if the address was Hannibal’s.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_I hope this reaches you. I’ve put my new address on here so you can find me. I hope you’re well. Classes are starting soon._

_I’m worried about you._

_Love, Will_

A week later, more of Hannibal’s drawings began to arrive. He still wrote no words, but his sketches were of a river that featured a beautiful bridge, with a little girl playing on the bank, with blonde hair.

More sketches of the Botticelli arrived, an anatomical drawing of a human heart pinned open to be examined on the inside, and a beautiful building rendered in almost photographic realism, save for the ghostly image of a little blonde girl looking out of a window, her features blurred.  
  
Finally, months later, just after Will’s eighteenth birthday, Hannibal sent words.   
  
_My dear Will,_

_Please forgive me for losing my figurative tongue. Sketches say what words cannot._

_I have found myself in Florence after leaving home. It’s a city of incredible beauty of every possible kind, a balm on one’s soul after witnessing the ugliness God permits in the world._ _  
_ _  
_ _I hope you do not take offense that I did not return to America immediately. I required some time alone. You have had enough grief, I will not burden you with the witnessing of my own when it is fresh and raw as a new wound._ _  
_ _  
_ _Florence, as beautiful a city as it is, has no alligators, and no Will Graham, or I think I would like to stay here, permanently._ _  
_ _  
_ _When we write again, I may be much closer._ _  
_   
Love, Hannibal

Will didn't have time with his classes to get back to Hannibal right away. Swamped with classes to do more than he needed and keep busy, and not social. Just him and Winston. When he found time in a short break, he wrote Hannibal, unsure if he would get it.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_Take your time. I am where I have always been: inside myself. Please be safe, that is all I ask._

_Love, your Will._

Three days later, another letter arrived, this one from England.  
  
_Dear Will,_ _  
_ _  
_ _I am finally on my way, after too many years, and too much life._ _  
_ _  
_ _I will see you soon, in person. If you’d like, we can become acquainted again._ _  
_ _  
_ _Love, Hannibal._   
  
Will sent out a letter the next day after getting it, to be sure Hannibal got it before he left London.

_Dear Hannibal,_

_You have my address. My number is attached at the bottom if you want to call me. I’m living in a small apartment in the DC area right now. Hope to hear from you soon._

_Love Always, your Will_


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) No beta. Quick edit through  
> 2) New cover for the story works for these last two and sort of how we imagined the boys? If it's not your cup of tea, feel free to use your own headcanon visuals.

 

The flight from London to New York, and then New York to Baltimore felt as though it took years to complete. Hannibal spent much of it sipping champagne, and leaning back in his first-class seat with his eyes closed, revisiting the New Orleans mansion around which the rest of his memory palace was constructed.  
  
Will was his touchstone, the point to which he returned over and over to center himself. He visited the fields around the mansion in his mind, his old room, and then watched Will groom Ravenstag in his mind, as he had done in person many times.  
  
Finally, he landed.  
  
A taxi took him to Will’s modest apartment, and Hannibal hesitated for a moment to touch the door with his palm, reverently, before knocking. He was certain that anxiety was one of the emotions that Mischa’s death had burned out of him, but there was still a ghost of it there. Hannibal trembled a little at the thought of laying eyes on Will again, and vice versa.

Shuffling behind the door and the sound of paws came, and then Will opened it, sure he’d get a call before Hannibal showed, and was taken by surprise to see him there, recognized only because they shared a picture a year with each other. It still did not prepare Will for the agonizing ache his chest felt to see him. He blinked large blue eyes behind his modest rimmed glasses, mouth slightly agape as he gazed over Hannibal. He was taller than Will, but he always knew Hannibal would be.

Self consciously, Will stuffed his flannel shirt into his pants, and wiped his hands on it and opened the door further for Hannibal.

Will was more arresting in person than any photo could possibly capture. His skin was like strawberries and cream, and his blue eyes looked even wider than they were as a boy. “Hello, Will.”

“Hannibal,” Will said quietly, ten years since they last saw each other, and it was familiar and yet foreign all at once. They’d both lost so much, and gained so little. Will stepped out of the way, letting Hannibal through, into his small apartment, where Winston stood, looking at him.

“And here is Winston,” Hannibal chuckled and offered his hand to the dog to smell before he looked around the apartment, and back at Will again. _“_ I feel as though I am dreaming.”

“Still dreaming,” Will said, blinking his big blue eyes. They were rolling into summer again, his own eighteenth birthday having just passed, and yet he felt years and years older already, the same sort of haunted feeling that seemed to be radiating off Hannibal.

“Your voice sounds just as I imagined it,” Hannibal chuckled, still staring. “I could see you every day, forever, and I would still remember this time.”

Will considered Hannibal for a moment, just letting his gaze rest on him, hands tense at his sides, but fingers slowly relaxing. “Many nights I looked up at the sky.  Orion above the horizon and, near it, Jupiter.  I wondered if you could see it, too.  I wondered if our stars were the same.”

Hannibal smiled at that, his dark eyes sparkling, and he hugged Will to him gracefully, and tightly, just as he had when they were boys. “Our minds have refused to part for a long time, I believe some of our stars will always be the same.”

Will had not been touched, not hugged since his mother died, and the very embrace made him rigid at once and then he relaxed into Hannibal’s arms. He wrapped his arms around him, broader himself now, but not as much as Hannibal. He nosed his face in against his neck, swallowing hard. “I never thought I’d see you again.”

Will fit into Hannibal’s embrace, against the contours of his chest like a puzzle piece that he’d lost, long ago. Hannibal closed his eyes when Will hugged him, and took a deep breath of Will’s curls.

This alone was worth leaving Florence and all it’s diversions. “I knew we would meet again, but I was delayed, over and over,” Hannibal murmured, softly.

Will had been so dismayed when Hannibal had not returned that summer, or the next, or the next… His world seemed to crumble, no matter how many letters they sent, it seemed they would never hug like this again. Afraid he might crumble, Will let go a little. How long would Hannibal stay though, how long until they’d say goodbye again.

“I’m… sorry for Mischa. Your uncle sent me a letter.” It was blunt, maybe not what Hannibal needed, but Mischa was as close to a sister as he had ever had, even just for six months of his life.

Hannibal’s handsome face went a little blank, and he stared at the space over Will’s shoulder before he looked at him again, and nodded. He still had not spoken of it since it had happened. There were no words in any language he could find to express the horror.

“It was sudden,” he managed to whisper, opening up like the heavy door of a dungeon creaking open to admit a sliver of light.

His face remained expressionless, but he went cold to the touch in Will’s arms.

Will wrapped his arms tighter around Hannibal for moment, squeezing him, and then he let go, brows furrowed.

“Didn’t mean to…” Will sighed, aggravated with himself for being so socially inept about these things. He’d learned to block people out pretty well, turning off his social receptors all together. “Sorry.”

Wills scratched the back of his neck, and paced.

“There is no need for an apology,” Hannibal reassured Will, and watched him pace, fascinated with the dazzling beauty his childhood friend had become. “It has been a difficult time, but I’m relieved to see you, at last. I tried, more than once to make it to New Orleans, much to my Uncle’s chagrin.”

Will nodded, his eyes everywhere but Hannibal, it was almost overwhelming to be around him again, to be close and yet so far even still. It’s all he dreamed about when he wasn’t having nightmares. “I know.”

“You still find eyes distracting,” Hannibal noted as Will avoided his. It was odd to be a stranger to someone he felt he knew, intimately.

“I see too little, I see too much,” Will sighed, not sure what he would see if I looked at Hannibal, not sure if it was the same little boy he fell in love with, or if they were so different now that they were simply not alike.

“Are you afraid of seeing too little of me, or too much?” Hannibal asked, curiously. The years and loss made Will edgier than he had been, shyer.

Cautious was the word Will preferred. He didn’t let people close, he didn’t get close. It too much. “I’m afraid you’ll leave  just once I get to know you again.”

“I have no parents to drag me away, and a four year commitment to medical school in town,” Hannibal pointed out, pulling a letter of acceptance from his pocket to hand to Will.

Will looked at the letter, but he didn’t take it, he trusted Hannibal, he was just being defensive, it’s how he got most people to leave him alone. He didn’t want that of Hannibal though. “Sorry, I-... I believe you.” He took his glasses off and set them aside, rubbing his eyes.

Hannibal watched Will, well aware of the new wall up between them, constructed by time, and distance. Will’s heart was wrapped in scar tissue now, harder to reach.

“Shall I return to my hotel, and we can write one another again?” Hannibal asked, with a little smile.

Will’s eyes went wide and he shook his head, floppy curls and all. “No, no!” He said, grabbing Hannibal’s wrist, to keep him, but he felt a new strength in Hannibal, a new energy he hadn’t expected. “Stay.”

Hannibal’s eyes warmed at the touch, and the bounce of Will’s curls above his surreal eyes. He smiled, and stepped closer to Will, admiring the soft perfection of his skin. “Alright, I’ll stay,” Hannibal said, more quietly, their faces nearly touching. “What is it you’re studying?”

Will leaned in closer, more familiar now, able to smell _his_ Hannibal. “Forensics.”

Hannibal chuckled at that, and mirrored Will. Every cell in his body seemed to relax when he breathed in Will’s scent, never forgotten after so many years. It felt as though Hannibal were suddenly wrapped in a warm blanket, curled up with his best friend again. “You’re set on heroics, without having to occupy the spotlight.”

“I want to help save lives without having to be center stage,” Will admitted, watching Hannibal's face, all the new curves of cheek bone, dip of his Adam’s apple when he spoke or swallowed. Will had admittedly always found his best friend the most perfect, and no one else compared.

Hannibal only proved his point by standing there. “Then you may have found your calling, or, at least one of them,” Hannibal said, able to tell Will was staring at him just as much as he was staring at Will’s milky skin, and rosy lips.  A moment of silence where neither of them remembered to speak passed, and Hannibal smiled. “Your latest photo hardly did you justice.”

One of them. There was something about that sentence that Will couldn’t quite place, but Hannibal’s next words made the thought skip his mind completely as a heat rose up his chest and through his cheeks, over his hidden ears under trendles of curls.

“I think it probably did more for me,” Will canted his head slightly, eyes on Hannibal’s jaw. “Not exactly top notch, or fine bred.”

Hannibal touched Will’s cheek with his thumb, over the blush that stained his poreless skin with pink, and swallowed. “Pedigree only really matters when it comes to horses, and even then, there are exquisite exceptions.”

Chuckling at that, Will only turned his face slightly into the touch, eyes wandering from Hannibal’s jaw to his lips, more defined now than they had been when they were ten years younger. Admittedly, Will kept Hannibal’s picture and studied him nightly, to dream, and wonder, and let his imagination fly.

It was better than the nightmares, but even then sometimes he had nightmares _about_ Hannibal. About Mischa, and he hadn’t even been there.

“Ravenstag is still fine, by the way…”

“Good, I was about to ask,” Hannibal murmured, and dropped his hand to Will’s shoulder, but did not stop memorizing his fairy-tale features. “When did you see him last?”

“A few months ago when I went to check on my dad,” Will said, with a little smile, and moved his head back to where it had been, the weight of Hannibal’s hand was grounding, and yet almost there to keep him from drifting off into a fantasy that would never be.

“How is he?” Hannibal asked, and held on to Will’s shoulder like he was convincing himself Will was still really in front of him.

“Good. Probably lonely now that his parents are gone,” Will explained, taking a deep breath, convincing himself that he couldn’t just put himself in Hannibal’s arms and stay there. Hell, Hannibal probably had girl friends before. Someone waiting on him…

“I’ve purchased a house here, nothing as grand as the mansion of course, but it is out of the city and has a small stable. I thought it might be good to bring our old friend.”

“I can arrange to have him shipped if you want him,” Will said, envying Hannibal’s ability to buy what he needed. Will hated DC, he’d much rather drive a long ways to school than live in the noise.

“That would be lovely, would you like to see the place?” Hannibal offered, a little knowing glint in his eyes as he did.

Will nodded without even having to think about it. He grab a leash for Winston, and hooked him to it, and the dog wagged happily to get to go out for a while. “Sure.”

“I parked my car just outside,” Hannibal said, still unable to help but gaze at Will as they stepped out. He could never have imagined how beautiful a man could be, until he clapped eyes on Will moments ago.

Will locked up the place and slid keys into his jeans pockets. He left his glasses in side, but honestly he was hoping he wouldn’t need them. “I’ll let you drive then.”

Hannibal unlocked the doors of a sleek, elegant, dark blue car and held the passenger doors for Will and Winston, to the front and back seats.

“Are you hungry?” Hannibal asked, something he used to ask his friend all the time, always playing host.

Winston crawled into the back, head out the window, tongue out. Will got into the passenger seat and shook his head. “I’m alright.”

Hannibal closed the doors for them and got into the driver’s side, started the car, and headed out of the city with Will. It still felt as though he was dreaming.

“Have your tastes changed at all since we were young?” Hannibal asked, savouring the words, as though that was a loaded question.

“I like coffee now a lot more than cocoa,” Will admitted with a little smile. “I guess the rest is the same.”

“Have you eaten alligator since our little adventures?” Hannibal asked as they moved through the city traffic, deftly. Winston laid down, and stretched out over the leather seats in the back.

“Now and then. Not for years though,” Will sighed, hands in his lap, rubbing them nervously. It was just Hannibal, but there was something about being close again after remembering all their snuggling as kids that made him nervous.

In the opposite way, being alone with Will was the most relaxing, serene experience Hannibal had had since Will had been pulled out of his arms by his parents. 

“I’ve had many things since, but not alligator,” Hannibal chuckled, and looked at Will, admiring his profile, and the jumble of curls that almost hid his eyes. “They do not live this far north, do they?”

“Not usually,” Will replied. He looked over at Hannibal, big, blue eyes looking at him as he smiled a little bit more at the question. “Gotta go back south if you’re craving some of that. What did you eat?”

Hannibal smiled at the question, then looked at Will after he turned onto a highway heading out of the city itself. His dark eyes glittered, happily, the way they did when he had a secret when they were boys. “A little of everything,” he said, cryptically, and looked at the road again. “Florence was beautiful. I wish you could have been there.”

Will hated that there were secrets between them, though he had nothing to hide himself, he knew that something happened to Hannibal, the drawings said a lot but not enough. His smiled faltered a little. “Some of us were at college,” he said, a jab at Hannibal, but a tease just the same. “And penniless.”

Hannibal reached over to touch Will’s hand, taking it for a moment the way he had when they were boys, holding it. “So I was aware, at the time. Why do you imagine I left?” he asked.

A shocking thrill went through Will when Hannibal took his hand, his palms a little sweaty. “To come here?”

“To see you,” Hannibal said, and held Will’s hand as they drove down the highway, then slowed and turned into a long driveway that led to a house in the distance, surrounded by trees.

Will had, for a year, thought perhaps Hannibal didn’t want to see him after Mischa’s death, that he was being avoided. After his mother killed herself, he couldn’t help but feel abandoned by everyone, even his father. “I thought you’d never come.”

Hannibal stopped the car in front of the house, and then looked at Will for a long moment. “I promised you that I would, as soon as I could manage to return. I always keep my promises,” he said, sincerely, and turned off the car. The land around them was blissfully silent. No traffic, no people, nothing but them and a few birds, the rustle of branches in the breeze.

Will’s mama also said she’d never leave, he was too precious to her, but he knew that wasn’t true either.

Stumbling out of the car, Will had to let go of Hannibal’s hand to get out, and then let Winston out of the back, who started to run for the field, wagging all the way. At nearly ten years old, Winston still had a lot of pup in him. “It’s nice out here. Reminds me of home.”

Hannibal watched Will’s expression as he looked at the house and land around it for the first time, and smiled at that. He’d been hoping that was what Will would say. Hannibal looked around with him. “I could not find anything with a swamp in this area,” he chuckled. “I did ask, the realtor thought I was mad.”

“One might think you were trying to entice me to come live here,” Will said, hands on his hips, looking around at all the land, where Ravenstag would roam, and Winston could go outside more often. When realized he said what he thought outloud, he flushed and bit the inside of his cheek. “I mean, we’d be glad to visit anytime.”

Hannibal laughed, and gestured at the house with a cheeky smile, welcoming Will to it as he walked to the front door. “I am the sole occupant, and I do have far more room than I need,” he reasoned as they walked to the front door. “This would be far better for studying than your small studio apartment in the middle of the city,” he reasoned, and let Will in.

The house was cool and spacious, obviously expensive, but not as gothic as the mansion in New Orleans, by far.  
  
As Will mentally kicked himself, he walked into the house, Winston not far behind, who went to sniff out everything. “I wouldn’t dream of intruding.”  
  
Hannibal followed Will. He had just purchased the house this morning, with precisely this in mind. They reached the kitchen, which was large, with windows that overlooked the grassy field in the back with a stream running through it, and the modest but very well-made stables.  
  
“I _was_ going to have to hire someone to look after Ravenstag,” Hannibal mused. “Which would cost a fortune…”

Will raised a skeptical brow back at Hannibal. “Are you _hiring_ me?”

“Room and board in exchange for horse care?” Hannibal offered with a little smile. “Ravenstag already knows you, it seems ideal.”

Will couldn’t help but be excited and little unsettled at the same time. He’d get his horse back, his friend back, but intentionally hired to care. He couldn’t really tell if Hannibal was teasing, or if he was offering more to him. Opening up to someone again was going to take time, as Will had gotten quite good at blocking everyone out. “Okay.”

Hannibal watched Will process the news, and seemed to read his mind as he tilted his head.

“Would you like to pick out a room?” Hannibal asked, offering a hand, unable to wait to touch Will again, even his hand. Will felt like a home from which he’d been estranged for years.

“Sure,” Will said, quietly, and grasped Hannibal’s hand again, though his movements were more shy now than when Hannibal showed up at his door-- he was still processing.

Hannibal guided Will up the stairs, to the floor full of arched doorways and dark wood. “I haven’t picked out a room yet, the two across from one another are the same size,” Hannibal said, peeking into one of the rooms.

“Which do you want?” Will asked, gazing at the other one, their hands still twined together as they pulled two ways, but never parted. “This one looks out over the field…”

“Then that one will be yours, and I’ll take the other,” Hannibal said, and walked into the big empty room with Will, happy just to be around him.

Will stopped in the middle of the room, never once letting go of Hannibal’s hand. “It’s bigger than my whole apartment.”

“It will be quieter, safer, and better for Winston,” Hannibal noted, looking down at the fluffy, old friend he’d sent in lieu of his own presence.

“Yeah, for Winston,” Will said quietly, letting his fingers slip from Hannibal’s a moment as he walked to the window to look out of it. He hadn’t seen so much green since he was last at the mansion.

“And Ravenstag, of course,” Hannibal noted, then walked to the closet to peer inside before he opened the door to Will’s private bathroom. “Do you still sleepwalk?”

“Not sure about lately,” Will admitted. “Not waking up anywhere weird, anyway, but Winston usually gets to me before I do. I don’t make it past the bathroom.”

“Well, I am just across the hall this time, no need to cut your feet walking the length of a rocky field,” Hannibal said, with a nod at his own room and a smile.

“No? You don’t want to play doctor in the middle of the night again?” Will smiled over his shoulder at Hannibal. “I told you, you’d be a good doctor.”

“Yes, I remember that,” Hannibal chuckled, smiling fully at Will. “You were my very first patient. I will have to practice on you now and then…”

“You did a good job. No scars or anything,” Will laughed, shaking his head.

Hannibal barely heard what Will said, he was transfixed by the flutter of Will’s heavy, almost feathery eyelashes. He laughed when Will laughed, and nodded, replaying what Will had actually said in his mind to catch up.  
  
“To think, all I had was a stolen manicure kit. May I bring your feet as proof of my skill and bedside manner to my clinical rotations?” Hannibal teased, and took a step closer to Will, unable to resist a pull that coaxed him closer, like magnets in their chests that could only be resisted for so long.

Will’s almost green blue eyes drifted from the light out the window to Hannibal as he got closer. He reached his hand out to Hannibal , a bold move like when they were children. “They aren't nearly as small or cute anymore.”

Hannibal was well aware that Will, especially now that he was grown, was not the sort to reach out often. He took Will’s hand, and felt the warm sensation in his chest that he had when they touched as children. “Time seems to have been kind to the rest of you, I’m sure your feet are no exception.”

They were still admittedly young, though both worn from life so early on. Will didn't let that stop him from letting that warmth flood him when Hannibal was close again. He needed to feel that not everyone was going to abandon him. “Did you really buy this for the horse and to hire me?”

Hannibal curled his fingers in Will’s, slowly, and stepped closer. Will was soft, the way a favourite shirt was soft after being through the wash too many times. Suffering had made him even more perfect than he had been without it. “Shall we get your things and make the move official?” Hannibal asked, softly.

Will took that as his answer, that it wasn't solely for the horse, but a lure to get Will close again. It worked. “Yeah. Better to get that done.”

Hannibal knew Will understood, perfectly. That had not changed in ten years.

“Think of it as a permanent sleep-over,” Hannibal chuckled, and brushed some of Will’s cherubic ringlets out of his eyes.

Will nodded, and pulled Hannibal close to hug him, needing to be reminded he was not just another ghost or day dream. “You mean I won’t need my bed then?” he teased.

Hannibal slipped his arms around Will’s shoulders. They were still narrow, but solid, far stronger than they looked. “I would be lying if I pretended that I mind such a thing, or that I haven’t dreamed of it for years. When I imagine happiness, my mind returns to our hours spent curled together, tucked into a large bed like birds in a nest,” Hannibal whispered.

Will flushed, hands clasped together at the small of Hannibal's back,  reaching softly against the other man's neck.  “I dream of you every night. Of this. Us. Back together like we never were apart.”

Hannibal felt his own skin flush, and he spread his palms over Will’s back, keeping him close. It was almost as though he had never had to leave, save for the fact that they were grown now, and a very different thrill of tension hummed between them.  
  
“When my dreams are pleasant, they are of the same thing,” Hannibal admitted with a warm tone to his voice, holding Will a little more tightly.  “Knowing you, forging our bond was the happiest time of my life.”

“Same,” Will sighed, closing his eyes as he let his head rest against Hannibal’s shoulder, the same difference in height as they had had when they were children. “I have missed you.”

Hannibal noticed that by some stroke of luck, or elegant design, they had kept their relative sizes almost perfectly as adults. No amount of time could change how well they fit together.

“Your letters, and my own wallet are the only two things I took with me from the castle,” Hannibal whispered, as though speaking too loudly of that night might shake the foundations of his memory palace, and bring it crashing down.

“I have all your letters, your drawings, and the notebook you left, back in my apartment,” Will confessed. “I kept everything.” He turned his gaze now up at Hannibal, close now he didn’t want to let go, just like the day their parents tore them apart.

“We’ll keep them in the same drawer,” Hannibal whispered with a touch of his palm against Will’s milky cheek, his thumb brushing the delicate, dark fringe of lashes that lined Will’s lower eyelid.

“Let’s go get them so we can reunite every part of us,” Will suggested, making no move to leave, however, entrapped in Hannibal’s arms.  
  
Hannibal smiled at that, and rested his cheek over Will’s head, likewise, not moving a muscle to let go of Will. They were once again wrapped in a cocoon of contented peace, and after the last ten years without it, both of them wounded by loss after loss, it was hard to let go.  
  
“I was just about to suggest that,” Hannibal murmured, eyes closed.

“And my bed, so we can sleep at some point,” Will whispered, contentment taking over that he started to lose track of where he was all together. It didn’t matter, Hannibal was here again.

Hannibal laughed, unguarded and genuine, the way he laughed when Will said something like that, something that was so pragmatic and down-to-earth that it should have ruined the moment, but only improved it.  
  
“Also a wise decision, and your clothes, Winston’s things…” Hannibal sighed, eyes still closed.

Will would stand there all day, but honestly they did need to get his things since Hannibal had nothing here yet. A bed to sleep on, to curl up into together and catch up. Or just lay there. Will didn’t care. “Okay,” he agreed, and finally pulled back and took Hannibal’s hand.

***

Hours later they had all of Will’s things, which wasn’t much, in the new house, the bed and his dresser set up in the bedroom and few of his things in the closet. Winston had his dog bed down by the fireplace and his food and water set up.

They’d stopped by the grocery store to get things to make for dinner. Now in the kitchen, with what little cookware Will had and what came with the house, they moved about the counters to prepared the chicken together, quietly, as words were not needed.

Hannibal purchased the house with everything in the house to show it included, so they had most of the very basic necessities, much like moving into a doll house, of sorts.  
  
“Do watch yourself with that knife, it’s especially sharp,” Hannibal warned Will as he began to saute onions, humming softly to himself as he cooked. He found, in Florence, that it was something he enjoyed, and something he was good at.  
  
“I’m careful,” Will said, working slowly, not nearly as fast as Hannibal, but he wanted to be efficient, not without fingers.“I don’t think I’m technically permitted to reattach digits, yet, but I’d try,” Hannibal chuckled.

Will rolled his eyes and scooped the chopped carrots into his hand and into Hannibal’s pan. “See, no blood.”

Hannibal reached back to take Will’s hand to inspect it. He didn’t need to, of course, but every touch to Will felt like a grounding force. “Very good, would you mind setting our small table?” he asked, with a soft smile.

Will smiled softly and took his hand back, coyly, and then took the dishes down they just unpacked. He set the table with them and  forks. It felt surreal to be here with Hannibal, eating like a _family_.

“My mother once said it was the discovery of cooking that created man, as a species. Our skulls did not become uniquely human until after our ancestors tamed fire and began to roast meat over it. We are still the only species to cook,” Hannibal murmured as he swirled sauce in a pan.

“You’re mother was always well read and smart,” Will noted, and moved back over toward Hannibal, the table set. He stepped in behind him, and rested his chin on his shoulder, hands on his waist, perfectly natural.

“Not many people realized she had two Ph.D.s,” Hannibal smiled a little sadly as he cooked. “She was always simply the beautiful Italian my father married.”

“As is the way of the world in most places,” Will sighed, inching fingers around Hannibal’s hips.

Hannibal smiled to himself, and looked back at Will. His heart began to hammer a little harder at that, and he nearly dropped the spoon he held..

“So it is,” Hannibal whispered, barely aware of what he was saying.

Will rested his face up against Hannibal’s shoulder, and hugged him tight. It was hard to be away from him now that he had him again, like his whole world fell right back into place, despite all they had lost together. “Chicken almost done? I’m starved.”

Hannibal had to refocus on the meal, distracted by the feeling of Will touching his hips like that.  “Finished as we speak,” he said, and turned down the flame under the pan, then turned to plate their meals.

Will let go, if only to let Hannibal work, and watched him and then set the plates on the table, and sat down, kicking Hannibal’s chair out for him.

Hannibal chuckled at Will’s improvised good manners, and set the plates before them, then brought a bottle of wine, and poured some in each of their glasses. “Nothing complicated, chicken primavera,” he announced, and sat in his kicked out chair.

“How did you manage the wine?” Will asked, though knowing Hannibal he snuck it over from overseas. He leaned over the plate and cut into the food, taking a bite with a loud hum.

“I have luggage with many compartments, I simply _forgot_ it was in there,” Hannibal said, innocently, and placed his napkin in his lap.

Will grinned and sipped the wine. He’d stolen a few bottles once from a winery, just to see if he could, and drank them. He felt sick the next day, but so worth it. “It’s good.”

“A pleasant German white wine, it goes well with something light and fresh,” Hannibal said, and cut a piece of the chicken as he spoke. “Of course, if you don’t like wine, don’t feel obligated to drink it,” he assured Will.  It was enchanting, the feeling of knowing Will so thoroughly, and meeting him again all at once.

“I have only had it once,” Will said, and cut into his meal, happy to stuff food into his mouth, where he hardly ate at all usually.

“What was the occasion?” Hannibal asked with a little smile, happy to see Will eat with gusto.

Will stopped and looked at Hannibal, licking his lip. “I,uh, was curious. Bored. So I stole a few bottles.”

Hannibal laughed aloud at that, delighted, and took an inhale of the bouquet of his wine. “From where did you steal them?”

“A winery. They were sitting out in crates to be shipped,” Will explained, shaking his head. He finished his chicken, and swallowed another sip.

“Do you remember the kind?” Hannibal asked, amused at Will’s little crime spree.

“No. I got rid of the evidence as fast as I could, and threw up the rest of the day. Dad thought I was sick with the flu…”

Hannibal laughed harder, then sipped his wine as he smiled at Will over the table, and shook his head. “Have you stolen anything else? Aside from the hearts of half of the campus population, I’m sure,” he murmured, eyes roving over Will’s ivory skin, his perfectly sharp nose.

Will’s turn to laugh, he shook his head. “Watermelons,” he sighed and took a longer sip. “I don’t socialize.”

“Watermelons?” Hannibal asked, both subtle eyebrows rising up his forehead as he laughed at the strange choice of loot. “Are you particularly fond of them?”

“It was a dare. I did it. I was desperate to be accepted,” Will admitted. “I wasn’t though. They just wanted to see what I would do-- _if_ I’d do it.”

“Who were they?” Hannibal asked, with a tilt of his head as he picked up his wine glass again, watching Will help him get caught up on the last ten years that he had missed. He was a little jealous of them, for having Will’s time, whoever they were.

“Some kids, I was thirteen I think,” Will sighed, and looked down into the wine glass before taking the rest down. “Unimportant is what they were.”

“Lucky enough to have your time, and foolish enough to waste it,” Hannibal sighed. “I would have given anything to be there, instead,” he murmured.

“I was the foolish one.” Will stood and gathered their plates to wash them, old habits.

Hannibal let Will wash, happy to establish a rhythm to their domestic life, as he watched him move, and sipped wine.  
  
“For trying to bond with your peers?” Hannibal asked, as he stared at the bare, smooth skin of Will’s neck under his feathery curls.

“One step forward is always three back. I stopped trying after that. Entertained myself. The wine thing, for instance,” Will said, mostly to the dishes, more open with Hannibal than he had been even with himself.

“No romantic entanglements?” Hannibal asked, looking into his wine as he waited for Will to answer.

The sound of laughter past Will’s lips was heard for a good solid minute before he even thought about answering. He shook his head, curls in his eyes as he dried the plates and forks. “No. Are you kidding me?”

“Why is that a ridiculous idea?” Hannibal asked, shifting forward in his chair to look at Will before he stood, wine in hand.

“I can barely function in class, let alone do anything else. I’ve shut myself down from everyone, it’s easier, makes me less gullible.” Will dragged the pan into the sink, and started to scrub off the food.

“You don’t seem awkward, or gullible to me, at all,” Hannibal said as he rested his hip against the counter, and watched Will’s hands scrub the pan.

“That’s because we know each other,” Will stated, flatly. “I don’t have interest in finding anyone to be romantic with. It… takes so much out of me to get to know people, to hope they will get to know me and not… leave.” He looked up at Hannibal. “I have you back. You and Winston, that’s all I need.”

Hannibal’s eyes looked the slightest bit disappointed when Will said that, and he finished his wine, neatly, then rinsed his glass under the running water in the sink. “And soon, Ravenstag will join us again. A quartet, away from the exhausting crush of the city.”

Will nodded, sensing Hannibal’s disappointment, but he didn’t say anything, he didn’t want to assume. “I’d ask the same of you,” he murmured, going back a few steps, “if you had any romances.”

Hannibal smiled to himself, and then Will, washing and drying his own glass. “Nothing worth mentioning,” he sighed.

“But it was something.” Will couldn’t help but feel slightly betrayed, that he hadn’t been Hannibal’s only wish and thought. He set the plates back in the cabinet after drying them, the silverware back in the drawer, clean now as if they were never used at all.

“A handful of ill-advised dalliances, certainly no emotions involved, only adolescent experimentation,” he said, watching Will carefully, able to see the thought stung him.

The thought left a very big heavy weighted feeling in Will’s chest. Will hadn’t done anything, hadn’t wanted to, his only thoughts ever were of Hannibal, carrying his picture around everywhere like some boyfriend sent overseas.

Winston whined at Will’s feet, as though able to tell his mood change often, and came to let Will pet him. Will’s fingers slid through soft fur, and grounded himself, unaware he hadn’t even said anything.  
Hannibal watched Will, closely, and Winston as he seemed to comfort Will. “As I said, they were like the boys you tried to befriend,” Hannibal said, softly. “Unimportant.”

Friends were one thing, but what Hannibal suggested was another. Will nodded slowly, and took a deep breath, fingers clenched slightly in Winston’s fur, and then let go. “Yeah.” He moved toward the stairs. “I’m going to shower.”

Hannibal watched Will, quite aware that he had upset him, but that it was likely best to let Will have a little space. 

“Of course. I’ll make a few calls to have Ravenstag brought here,” he said, softly. One part of him felt like a stone was lodged in his throat at the thought of hurting Will, another was relieved that although Will didn’t want a romance with anyone, he objected to the thought of Hannibal having romances.  
  
Perhaps they were on the same page, after all.

“Sure,” Will said, taking the stairs with Winston at his heels, nudging him gently with his wet nose. Perhaps Will had misread their letters, misread everything. He’d been caught up in Hannibal since they were boys, he just assumed Hannibal reciprocated.

Will took a long, hot shower, until the water ran out and turned cold, skin pinked from the heat. He trudged out in a towel into his bedroom that was conjoined, where Winston sat at the end of his bed waiting.

Hannibal knocked, softly, on Will’s door, and waited politely for him to answer. He carried a stack of towels in hand, and a mug of hot chocolate.

Will slipped into a pair of boxers, and a t-shirt before opening the door, and then left it open as invitation for Hannibal.

“I thought I’d bring fresh towels, so that your bathroom remains stocked,” Hannibal said as he stepped in. He stopped short, looking Will over. The wet from his skin soaked through the thin shirt, and boxers, and he looked alluringly touchable.  “I also brought a drink,” Hannibal said, and offered the hot chocolate to Will, with an apologetic expression.

Will dried his hair with the towel he had before, and looked over at Hannibal, a keen distance between them, not merely physically, but Will had pitched his forts. “Thanks.”

Hannibal’s eyes softened, and he let out a soft sigh. “I feel as though I’ve offended you,” Hannibal said, softly, and looked at Will again. It was strange to feel a sense of fear that he had made a mistake with someone after so long of being nearly numb to it.

“Just a misunderstanding, I think. I… read more in your letters perhaps than what was actually there,” Will explained, folding the towel over once before letting it sit on the door hanger to dry. “My mistake. Again.”

Hannibal swallowed, his heart rising in his throat as he did.  “You were not the only one to read more than friendship into our letters. However, I also assumed that while I was gone you would have a life of your own. You would find some girl, or worse yet, some boy, and when we met again I would resent them for it. I … sought to make certain that we would meet on an even score,” he looked down. “Obviously, I was wrong.”

Will felt cracked in two; damned if he had and damned if he had not. What’s done was done, after all, but it did little to ease peace in his mind.

“Then you do-- _did not_ \-- know me as I thought,” Will sighed, trying to smooth back his unruly curls with both hands, somewhere for them to be. “I don’t make friends, why would have a boyfriend? How could I possible find the means to get someone to like me enough for that? It’s not who I am.”

“You found me. I reasoned that I could not possibly be the only one in the world who thought you were lovely,” Hannibal sighed, with sad eyes at the first crack in their relationship.

“Finding me ‘lovely’ and knowing me are different. I don’t… I’m not into meaningless relationships. I _can’t_ do that,” Will explained, Winston at his side again, looking at up him.

Hannibal sighed, and swallowed, locking eyes with Will, pleadingly.“I did not think it impossible for you to find something with meaning,” he said, softly.

Will needed connection to feel attraction, otherwise it was just simply not there. This made it especially hard for him, considering the empathy and being so… strange. Will sighed deeply, long fingers stretched against Winston’s head. “I already had it. I was waiting for it to come back home.”

Hannibal held his breath for a long moment, and then looked down, into the cup of hot cocoa he’d brought Will to lift his spirits. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, his voice a little rough as his spirit sank, like a stone through ocean water. “Did I ruin it?” he asked, able to feel the tension in the room like a violin string wound perilously tight.  
  
Will’s empathy made it difficult to stay upset, to feel what he needed to feel, to justify himself. All reasons why he never let people close. He tugged his bottom lip between his teeth. Whatever understanding he thought was secretly written in those letters was just a fairytale.

“I…” Will crossed his arms over his chest. “I don’t know. I need time I guess. To adjust to everything, to you…”

Hannibal set the mug of cocoa aside, and stepped closer to Will, looking at him. A twisting ache was spreading through his chest, and he thought of a teacup Mischa had dropped before her death, the way it shattered in a second.  
  
“It was experimentation for the sake of experimentation,” Hannibal insisted, intensely. “My heart, my thoughts were with you, always, Will,” he said, able to feel his own heart start to flail in his chest like a bird panicking in a cage that was too small.  
  
“How comforting,” Will spat, bitterly. He looked around the room for his jeans and boots, and started to get dressed. “Let me go out and make things even for us, maybe then we’ll be able to make things right.” His usual sea blue gaze was dark and foreboding.

Hannibal set his jaw, and he stared at Will, the blood running out of his face. “Please, Will …” he managed, through a tight throat, beginning to lose his calm.

“Isn’t that what you wanted?” Will asked, his tone getting louder, more frazzled, his vision was blurring as his skin heated. “For things to be _fair_?” He slid into his jeans and sat on the edge of his bed to put his boots on, hastily.

“No, Will, I wanted _you,”_ Hannibal said, standing in the door like a blockade, all shoulders. “And I couldn’t have you, and it was torture,” he said, a little breathlessly.

“So just find a warm body to… to curl up with and pretend?” Will’s eyes were red rimmed, betraying his anger with the hurt he felt in his chest, like he couldn’t breathe, panic setting in. Winston nosed his palm gently.

Hannibal bit his own lower lip, then licked it, and stared into Will’s eyes, his own feelings rising to boil over his normally cool exterior. “Because I could not have you, I settled for what I _could_ have. None of it meant a thing, Will. Isn’t meaning what you crave?” Hannibal asked, still keeping Will from the door.  
  
“Is that what our relationship would be? You going after for the physical while being there for me only emotionally?” Will  was seeing in blurs and reds,  unaware he’d started to cry until he wiped at his eyes and tried to move past Hannibal, but he was a force stronger than he expected.  
  
“ _No,_ ” Hannibal said, firmly, and reached out to hold Will by his waist, with both hands, keeping him steady.  
  
“No, it would be everything it should have been if we were never separated. I comforted myself with others while we could not be together, but I _swear_ , on Mischa’s grave that if we are together, I would rather die than stray,” Hannibal said, shaking where he stood, even his breathing was ragged.

Will used the hold to slide between Hannibal and the door frame, and then put his hands on his wrists, and pushed them off. “I dunno, Hannibal…”

Hannibal moved quickly, turning to follow Will, his eyes desperate and black as he did so, as dark as Ravenstag, who was now on his way. “Will, I am sorry,” he said, accent getting thicker as he grew more upset.

“It was foolish and childish, I have no desire to touch anyone but you, and I will keep my promise. I always keep my promises. I promised I would write, I did. I promised that I would try to come to see you and I tried, more than once. I tried to leave five times with Mischa to make it to America…” he said, quickly, darting in front of the stairs to keep Will from leaving, his chest heaving under his expensive shirt.  
  
“I wish I had known to make you promise to keep it in your pants,” Will all but growled, bitterly, stopping where Hannibal got in his way, hands clenched at his sides. “I didn’t know I had to. I was so stupid… So gullible, so naive.”

“I didn’t know that you wanted me to be chaste,” Hannibal insisted, staring at Will like his leaving would suck all of the life out of him, all of the air out of the room, and everything would end there and then. “Had I known, I _would_ have,” he said, very seriously, meeting Will’s eyes. “Look at me, Will, you can tell that I am being honest. If I had known you wanted me to be chaste until we were reunited, I would have done so without any difficulty.”

“Fine,” Will sighed, resigning. “It’s _my_ fault. Forgive my nine year old self for not knowing you wouldn’t want him wholeheartedly forever.” Will had fallen deeply for Hannibal so young, and now he was wondering if it was just stupid, childish infatuation.

Hannibal’s dark eyes went red around the edges, and flooded with tears. He was silent for a moment, his eyes shimmering with a dangerous level of emotion in them, then touched Will’s cheek, tenderly as one of the tears fell, and streaked down his cheekbone.

“I do want you wholeheartedly, and forever,” he whispered.  
  
Will could have kicked himself, but his empathy couldn’t _not_ reach Hannibal, and when it did, he was doomed. He felt himself lean into the touch, betraying his own anger. “Give me time.”

Hannibal nodded, softly, and stroked his thumb over Will’s cheek as he looked at him, another tear escaping from his other dark eye. He looked as though he’d been knocked in the gut, all of the suave confidence replaced with raw, primal emotion as he stared at Will.

“Don’t leave,” Hannibal managed.

“Where would  I go?” Will asked, taking deep breaths to calm himself, slowly. He reached for Hannibal, gripping his shirt by his hip.

Hannibal pulled Will to him in a tight hug, clinging to him as he laid his head over Will’s, and breathed hard. Adrenaline surged through his body, and he could barely think rationally, everything inside him was raw and almost too vivid to bear as the memory palace shifted, as though in an earthquake.  
  
“I don’t know. Please, stay. Please, please,” Hannibal whispered into Will’s curls. He had never been this rattled, this shaken … save for the moment when he pleaded, like this, for Mischa not to be dead, holding her.

Used to disappointment, Will was not giving his hopes up. He hardly felt he knew Hannibal now, despite the letters and drawings. This bit of information left Will feeling drained and raw, betrayed. “You’re all I have. You are as alone as I am.”

Hannibal took a deep breath as he held Will, quite aware, painfully so that he had just changed everything, shattered the fairytale with his experimentation, however meaningless it had been, however sure he had been that Will would already have someone.

“We are all we have,” Hannibal agreed, unable to make himself let go.  
  
Will’s body sagged a little against Hannibal, drained from it all, clearly he was not going to go anywhere. “So we are.”

Hannibal was adept at separating his heart from his body. Will was always in his heart, that was never in doubt. He had not known Will had the same foolish fantasies he had about being together, and had acted accordingly. Hannibal loosened the grip of his arms a little, and swallowed over the raw lump in his throat, then looked at Will, his eyes still red around the edges, full of regret.  
  
“I’ve disappointed you, I’m so sorry. It will never happen again,” Hannibal whispered, one hand against Will’s cheek again.

Will mentally kicked himself over and over again for not being more specific in his letters. He should have been. Much more. This was his fault. His fault for not saying, his fault for not bothering to find anyone else so he wouldn't feel so horrible about it now.

Toeing his boots off, Will left them there at the stairs, swallowing hard as looked up at Hannibal. “It's okay,” he said quietly, and took a step back toward his room.

Hannibal wanted to say he didn’t even remember their names, but he was sure that would only make things worse, somehow.  

“Would you rather I left you alone?” Hannibal asked, as he unwrapped his arms from around Will, but kept his hands against Will’s waist as he looked at him, with a small flicker of hope that all was not lost.

Conflicted, Will shrugged his slim shoulders. This had been what he wanted for a long time, all he ever looked forward to, and maybe it wasn’t fair to put those standards on something they hadn’t even talked about, and yet it hurt.

Hannibal pulled Will into his arms again, gently. The urge to fix the hurt he had caused was strong, and it was his instinct to hold Will until the cracks in their story mended themselves. “I’m sorry, Will,” he whispered. “I never imagined that it would hurt you.”

Will leaned his forehead against Hannibal’s shoulder, taking in and breathing out a shaky breath slowly. “What did you imagine I would feel?”

“Indifference, perhaps a tiny stab of envy, if I was lucky, nothing more,” Hannibal said, softly, and touched Will’s cheek with one hand, cradling him now with the other arm. “I imagined my feelings for you that had grown since we’d parted were one sided,” he sighed.

All those nights alone and thinking about Hannibal seemed to crash down, as Will had built up this thought of him that was clearly not true. They wouldn’t get to share that first together. Will huffed at himself. “Guess we should have been clearer.”

Hannibal swallowed, hard, and looked at Will. Will’s disappointment and anger were heart-breaking. As relieved as Hannibal was to learn that Will had feelings for him that weren’t platonic and nostalgic, he felt an urgency to smooth the hurt over. “I was certain if I told you, you would stop writing to me,” Hannibal whispered.

“Which option is better, Hannibal? Telling me then, or telling me now and _then_ some?” Will asked, vibrant blue eyes dark now.

“Why did you never tell me?” Hannibal asked Will, with a set jaw, dark eyes locked on his angelic roommate.

“Same reason you didn’t. I didn’t want to be that younger friend that had a crush on you,” Will said, sighing heavily as he looked at Hannibal.

“We both should have said something,” Hannibal whispered, and cupped Will’s jaw with one hand, unable to stop touching him. The feeling of Will’s skin was addictive. “We are together now, will you still accept me, despite my mistake?” Hannibal asked, the expression in his eyes making him look older by a number of years.

Nodding, Will felt himself melt in against Hannibal, just as when they were children, he couldn’t not feel intoxicated around his best friend. He would need a little time to come to grips with everything, to trust Hannibal completely, though.

Hannibal cradled Will with both arms now, his eyes closed as he rested his head against Will’s, heart beginning to come back to it’s normal slow rhythm. “I will always be sorry for my blunder,” he whispered, and buried his nose in Will’s hair. “Even if you forgive me.”

Will wanted to go back to before dinner, to before he knew at all, but they couldn’t. It wasn’t possible. They’d just have to work through it. “I’m sure you’ll find a way to prove it,” Will murmured.

“What would prove it to you?” Hannibal asked, cupping Will’s face with both hands again to tilt his perfect face upward, so that their eyes met, ocean blue on deep brown.

“Couldn’t say for certain,” Will whispered, swallowing thickly as he gazed up at Hannibal, his hands resting on his waist.

“Shall I have the word sorry tattooed onto my skin, somewhere?” Hannibal asked, only joking a little as he looked at Will. “Shall I let you carve it into me?”

Will rolled his eyes, and placed his hands on Hannibal’s wrists, pulling them off, and then taking his hand, tugging him back to his bedroom. “Not today.”

Hannibal almost looked disappointed at that, but his eyes brightened again as Will tugged him toward the bedroom again. He followed, obediently, and smiled a little. “Not today.”

Will didn’t bother to shut the door, as it was just them here. He let go of Hannibal and slipped his jeans off again and put them over the end of his bed. He put the towels away Hannibal brought, and picked up the now cool cocoa, and sat on the edge of the bed.

Hannibal sat with Will, shoulder to shoulder, and very hesitantly wrapped one arm around his waist from behind. The bed was as large and soft as Hannibal’s bed in the manor had been, with piles of smooth bedding and pillows. It was a welcoming nest.

“Perhaps I’ll do it myself, my penance,” he whispered.

Will drank the cocoa, smoothing over his anger and unrest about the situation, blinking blue eyes over at Hannibal as he spoke, searching his face. “Carve the word into your skin?”

“Somewhere my patients won’t see it, of course,” Hannibal said, looking his own arm over as though he was choosing an appropriate spot to mark.

“You’ll regret that mark,” Will said, knowingly.

“No. I’ll regret my short-sightedness before we were reunited,” Hannibal noted, and laid back in the bed, staring at the ceiling like there were stars etched into it. “The mark is inconsequential without the sin for which it stands.”

Will set the mug down on the nightstand and then leaned over Hannibal, one arm on either side of him, the rest of him off to the side, gazing down at him with big blue eyes curls falling down around his face. “Was it really a sin?”

“It certainly feels like one,” Hannibal sighed, and looked up at Will as he gazed at Will’s ethereal good looks. “I’ve offended an angel,” he murmured, and touched Will’s cheek with his hand, his heart beating faster. Hannibal was hardly prone to shame, even for acts most would consider barbaric, but Will made him feel it. Will made him feel _marinated_ in shame, with just a look.

“Maybe I should just make you talk about what you did,” Will suggested, wondering how Hannibal might react to having to do that. Would there be shame in his actions?  
  
Hannibal swallowed, and looked to the side, not used to the twisting feeling in his stomach at the thought. “You’d want to hear that?”

“I think I deserve to know what sort of competition I have, what I need to live up to and go above and beyond to make you forget about,” Will said, eyes steely as he spoke, almost deadly.

“You have no one to compete against, Will,” Hannibal said, a little lost in the look in Will’s eyes. Admittedly, it made his blood pump a little harder.

“Sure feels like it,” Will whispered, leaning in closer. “Meaningless or not, you gave one of them something you can’t get back. I can’t compete with that.”

Hannibal sighed, and wrapped his arm around Will’s shoulders, staring up at him before he brushed his long fingers over Will’s cheekbone. “You will hate me, more.”

Decidedly, Will knew that was probably true. He’d never live up to anything Hannibal had had, so he figured he wouldn’t bother to try. The younger man sighed, and  dropped down, curled around Hannibal, snuggling up against his side, head to his chest.

“There were only three,” Hannibal said, softly, and ran his hands over Will’s back, sure wings were going to spout from under Will’s shoulder blades at any moment and bristle at him. “I did not see them again, any of them. They did not matter to me any more than a glass of wine. They occupied a moment of my time, and were gone. No, I cannot have another first time, for that, I’m sorry. There are, however, many things I have never done before, with anyone but you. I have never asked another person to live with me. I have never held another person, and hoped that they will not hate me for too long, I have never professed love to another human being, I have never kissed anyone with whom I am in love, and have been, hopelessly, for years,” Hannibal said.

"You haven’t kissed me,” Will said, plainly, unmoving as he let his arm curl possessively around Hannibal’s middle. He never knew he’d be so jealous or so angry over someone, not even Hannibal.

Hannibal brought his face forward, so that their noses touched, and his heart began to race hard in his chest, galloping like a thoroughbred.“Would you allow it?” he whispered, suddenly short of breath.

Maybe a kiss was fine, Will reasoned, and swallowed when Hannibal got closer like that, and didn’t wait for him to kiss him, instead Will dragged Hannibal closer, letting their lips lock perfectly, his heart thrumming in his ears.

Hannibal’s speeding heart seized up for several beats when their mouths touched. He twitched from head to toe, and then embraced Will, trembling as he kissed him back. Will’s mouth shocked him with it’s warmth, with how splendid his soft lips felt, better than any Hannibal had ever kissed. Will truly had no competition, they had fallen to dust even before the second Will looked at him this afternoon.  
  
Hannibal hummed, softly, and tilted his head to fit their mouths together, kissing Will slowly.

Hooking his arm under Hannibal’s, Will latched onto his shoulder with long fingers, tugging Hannibal that much closer as he delved his tongue into the other man’s mouth, tasting every inch of his mouth.  Will had never kissed anyone before, but it felt perfectly natural to kiss Hannibal like this, like he’d been waiting a lifetime.

Hannibal very, very slowly brushed his tongue along Will’s and moaned at the sensation of it, at the taste of Will’s mouth. It was utterly perfect.  He sucked Will’s lower lip, slowly, experimenting as his head spun.

Body heating up slowly from his core out, Will was suddenly more than aware he was only in his boxers and a t-shirt still, pressed tight against Hannibal as they made out slowly for the first time. A little groan slipped out between their mouths, and he hooked a naked thigh over Hannibal’s clothed hip.

It did not matter at all who or what had come before Will, not when a single kiss from Will, and the curl of his leg eclipsed them all, and Hannibal felt like a beginner all over again. He parted his lips, and ran one hand down the side of Will’s smooth throat, then down his back to rest against his spine just above the hem of his shorts.  
  
Hannibal’s hands were like fire against Will’s skin, even through his clothes he could feel the heat from his palm, dragging more noises out of him he wasn’t even aware he had in him. “Hannibal-” he whispered, taking a breath.

Hannibal wound one long leg around Will’s hips and kissed his throat, up to his ear, then sucked the lobe slowly.

He rolled them over, so that Will was against the bed, and kissed his lips again, unable to get enough of them as they tangled themselves together in Will’s bed.  
  
“Yes?” he whispered, asking permission in a low, lust-rough voice.

Will’s mouth dropped open, almost panting with how turned on he was, never aware he could _feel_ quite like this, but had always hoped Hannibal would bring it out of him. All the pain, all the jealousy, seemed to melt away, stored somewhere else as Will grasped Hannibal’s shoulders, and the back of his head, keeping him just _there_. “I love you,” he whispered again, deeper this time, a groan at the very end of it as Hannibal’s weight kept him firmly against the sheets.

Hannibal closed his eyes at the words, and smiled slowly, melting inside at the knowledge that Will loved him, he’d said it.  He nuzzled Will’s face, softly, and kissed him again, with more passion as he slipped his thigh between Will’s thighs, and rocked against him through their clothes. “I love you, too. I always will,” Hannibal promised, without a shadow of a doubt.

There was no way Will would ever not love Hannibal, no matter how angry he got, or hurt. He cupped Hannibal’s face and kissed him harder, having wanted to do this exactly since he was about twelve years and just figuring out his own body and the things he could do with it and others. He’d only ever wanted Hannibal though.

“Don’t go away again,” Will whispered, desperately, kissing the feel of it into Hannibal’s mouth.

“Never,” Hannibal whispered against Will’s lips as their hips circled together, and he peeled Will’s shirt up, off of his torso with one hand, unable to stop kissing him feverishly.

As kids, they often changed in front of each other, but this felt so much more intimate suddenly, and Will gazed up at Hannibal as their mouth met and locked, his fingers working Hannibal’s buttons on his shirt undone. “I want to touch you.”

“Anything,” Hannibal whispered breathlessly, and pulled Will’s shirt off, over his head, then pulled his own off, for Will. “I am _yours_ ,” he promised, and laid over Will again, shirtless, then cupped his face to kiss him deeply.

Will flushed crimson, but smiled against Hannibal’s mouth, the words were what he needed to hear. His fingers dragged over Hannibal’s tight core, ghosting around his hips, and then up his chest, feeling out every old but very new parts of him he could. “You’ve changed a lot.”

“So have you,” Hannibal murmured back as his palm brushed over Will’s chest. His fingers played with Will’s pink, pert nipple. He teased the flesh there, and kissed Will’s throat, sucking marks into his pale skin as he worked his way down, lips between Will’s collarbones now.

Will’s breath got more ragged with every kiss and teasing touch Hannibal laid on him, hips rolling up against Hannibal’s on their own accord, searching for sweet friction, his erection tenting his thin, worn boxers. “I fantasized about you often, about this,” the brunet confessed raggedly.

Hannibal moaned at the feeling of Will erect under him, and kissed his way down to Will’s smooth, flat stomach.  “So have I, too many times to count, but nothing prepared me for this,” Hannibal confessed as he dragged his lips over Will’s stomach, to his hip. One hand rubbed over Will’s cock, stroking him slowly through his thin boxers as he scraped his teeth over the crest of Will’s pale hip.

“Oh-” Will’s eyes bloomed dark with lust suddenly at the touch, and he writhed under Hannibal’s ministrations, fingers reaching to tug on long, straight dark blond strands of hair as he spread his thighs to accommodate.

Hannibal tugged Will’s boxers down, exposing him slowly. He stared for a moment before he began to stroke Will with one hand, staring up at the blissful expression on Will’s face as he did so. “Anything you like, Will. I’m yours,” Hannibal repeated, softly, breathing the words against the smooth, tight skin of Will’s cock, breathing hard with lust.

“Promise?” Will breathed out, slowly, and watched Hannibal, all his fantasies seemingly coming to life right there.

“I promise,” Hannibal whispered, and nuzzled his nose against the base of Will’s cock, inhaling the scent of his most intimate parts before he ran his tongue up the long shaft.

Will kicked off his boxers, off the bed, and reached to touch any part of Hannibal he could, having craved to touch him for years, and yet didn’t want to stop him from what he was doing now either. The motion struck a match in his core, igniting his lust further.

Will was everything Hannibal had imagined he would be, and more. He was beautiful beyond even Hannibal’s wildest fantasies, and Hannibal heard himself groan with pleasure at the first taste of Will’s seeping cock.  
  
“Perfect,” Hannibal whispered, breathlessly, and sucked Will down slowly. He ran his tongue over the swollen head of Will’s cock, rimming the hard ridge of it with hot, wet muscle, then sucked slowly, hollowing his cheeks with a sigh.

Slim hips rolled up into Hannibal’s mouth, fingers grasping in the bed as more hot pleasure coursed through him. Will panted, biting his bottom lip hard enough to bleed.

“Hannibal…”

Hannibal was not yet an expert at pleasure, but the sound of Will gasping and panting as he sucked was enough to show him what Will liked. He ran his tongue over the wet tip of Will’s cock in his mouth, over and over again, caressing the sensitive skin with the warm roughness of his tastebuds.  “I love your taste,” Hannibal purred as he drew his lips back for a moment, and licked them, then sucked Will down again. His hands slipped under Will’s smooth ass, cupping and squeezing as he drew his body up, encouraging Will to press himself into his mouth, welcoming him.

Will gripped the sheets tighter, wrinkling them in his fisted hands, and arched his hips up, letting the hard ridges of his cock glide past Hannibal’s hot tongue over and over again. His body was worked up in a frenzy, movement slowly working their way out of his control as tension built in his heated core.

Hannibal could nearly taste the way Will tensed, even if he couldn’t feel it, and he moaned around Will’s cock. His dark eyes flashed up at Will and he urged him on with a devilish flicker of his tongue over the slit of Will’s cock before he sucked it again, kneading Will’s ass as he ground himself against the bed.

Panting harder, Will felt his world turn white hot behind his eyelids, hips forced up as he came, toes curled into the bed, as he gasps his groans, almost not sure _what_ had happened. Nothing he ever did himself felt quite that good.

Will erupted, hot, sticky and salty across Hannibal’s tongue. Hannibal moaned, and sucked, licking Will clean over and over as he lost control himself, coming against the edge of the bed he’d been rubbing against while he sucked Will.  He licked Will clean, breathlessly, not leaving a single pearly drop behind, then laid his head against Will’s stomach, panting as he wrapped both arms around Will’s slim waist. “My god,” Hannibal whispered, flushed and sweaty. His rosy, friction-plump lips brushed Will’s skin as he spoke.

Will reached and carded hands through Hannibal’s messy hair, warm and pliant now, not one ounce of defiance in him, even if he tried. “C’mere.” He said, aware that Hannibal had come too, probably a mess all in his pants, but Will didn’t care, he wanted to curl up and be close.

Hannibal swallowed again and smiled a little sheepishly as he undid his ruined pants, and kicked them to the floor, then climbed into bed to curl around Will, almost shaking with happiness.

“I love you,” Hannibal whispered again, into Will’s hair, snuggling beside him with his arms wrapped around Will, holding him tightly.

Naked and sweaty, Will pressed his ass against Hannibal’s hips, turning to his side, letting Hannibal spoon in against him, far different than when they were boys. He reached behind him and ran a hand over Hannibal’s muscular thigh.

“I love you, too, Hannibal,” he whispered back.

Hannibal groaned softly at the feel of Will laying against him like that, and the touch of his hand, and kissed the back of Will’s neck with tingling lips.  
  
“Do you promise?”

“I promise. I have loved you since we met and never stopped.” Will turned enough to kiss Hannibal's jaw gently, nipping at his bronze skin.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) No beta, we edited the best we could.  
> 2) It's the end guys! But we will be working on a sequel, and have put the story into a series so you can follow that if you want to know when we publish it!  
> 3) Or, hey, give us a follow on aTUMBLR

The weekend was spent wrapped around each other, drinking wine, and giggling like they were little boys again. Will cherished each moment of catching up, when most of what they did was kiss and snuggle. They had their whole lives to fit together again perfectly, to find themselves, but what mattered what they felt  _ complete. _

Monday morning, Will got up to go to class, packing a snack into his bag as Winston wagged at him.

Hannibal strode into the kitchen with a robe wrapped around him, tied at the waist. He smiled as he watched Will pack his bag with some of the crumble Hannibal had made over the weekend, and hugged him from behind.

“How long is your class today?” he whispered, against Will’s neck.

“Classes. I’ll be home late. I have to stop at the shelter for a few hours, get my paycheck…” Will said, not wanting to leave now that Hannibal was warm and sleepy behind him.

Hannibal sighed, and nuzzled his nose against Will’s ear before he kissed it.  “Ravenstag should be near when you are home,” he murmured.

“Can’t wait to see him then,” Will said, setting his bag down, he turned in Hannibal’s arms and kissed him sweetly on the mouth. He really didn’t want to go with the longing that was tugging at his heartstrings.

“I will be here, as well,” Hannibal promised, against Will’s lips as he kissed him again, slowly, ensuring that Will would think of him during his day at school.

Will worked very long and hard at his classes, wanting to finish early, just as he had gotten  _ in _ early. Without much to distract him, he was flying by pretty quickly, but he had a feeling that might slow down now that he had Hannibal back, and all his perfect distractions. “I hope so. I’d rather have you over the horse.”

Hannibal chuckled at that, and kissed Will’s jaw. “That might be uncomfortable, for myself, as well as the horse,” Hannibal joked.

Will rolled his eyes, once he figured out what he said could be and was taken suggestively. He nuzzled his face against Hannibal’s, content for once in life, he wanted to skip school for the first time since he started college. “You know what I meant.”

“Do you have to go today? Do you have an exam?” Hannibal asked, as Will nuzzled him like that, reluctant to see him walk out for any reason.

Will had responsibilities, a lot of them, work, school, everything to keep him preoccupied so he didn’t start thinking about things that would never be. Only those things  _ were _ now. “What would I do if I stayed home?”

“Stay in bed, let me serve you brunch,” Hannibal said, with an alluring look.

How could Will possibly say no to that? The look Hannibal gave him suggested far more than just brunch and lying around in bed all day. Will chewed his bottom lip thoughtfully, and pushed his bag away with one foot.

Hannibal laughed with delight and kissed Will again, undoing his jacket to peel it off of him when he pushed the bag away. “We can pick up your check later from the shelter,” Hannibal promised between kisses.

“Okay,” Will whispered, arms around Hannibal’s neck as he kissed him deeper, unable to get enough despite the fact they spent all weekend wrapped in each other.

Hannibal sighed against Will’s lips before they moved back to the stairs up to the bedrooms, both of them blind, unable to tear themselves away from the kiss for a second. “Thank you,” Hannibal murmured against Will’s neck, and bit the white skin there, testing it.

Will managed to get his boots off at the bottom, and then undid Hannibal’s robe,letting his fingers brush against skin, breathless and addicted to his boyfriend. He chuckled, falling back against the bed. “You’re going to be the death of my grades.”

“You’re far too clever for that,” Hannibal whispered against Will’s lips and laid over Will in the bed in Will’s room that they had claimed as theirs over the weekend. Hannibal kissed Will’s wrists and then nipped at his fingers, softly.

It was hard to imagine being mad at Hannibal at all when he was like this. Just like all the fantasies Will had about, wanting him, needing him… here he was. He laughed, and turned over, pulling his phone out of his pocket. “Let me at least send a message so I can get the homework for today, okay?”

“Alright,” Hannibal sighed, indulgently, and undid a button on Will’s shirt so that he could nibble at the line of his collarbone while Will texted.   
  
Will groaned as he texted the one classmate that would send him the information later, the only one that really liked him a little. Maybe. Then he tossed his phone aside and kissed Hannibal deeply. “Done.”

Hannibal kissed Will back, and undid his shirt the rest of the way, eagerly, then straddled Will’s narrow hips and pushed the shirt from his lithe body. “I will never tire of undressing you,” Hannibal sighed.

Will helped, tossing the shirt aside, letting their lips part for a moment, and then he kissed Hannibal again harder. “Like a gift? Unwrapping me.”

“Like the most beautiful gift I’ll ever receive,” Hannibal whispered, and undid his robe, then tossed it aside, nude underneath.

“Look at you,” Will groaned, hands touching Hannibal anywhere he could, over smooth bronze skin  that Hannibal had been willing to mark forever for Will’s forgiveness.

Hannibal leaned over Will again, sandy brown hair falling in his dark eyes, and kissed the underside of Will’s jaw as he rolled his hips against Will’s.

“Finish undressing me,” Will whispered, still in his jeans, as he reached to grip Hannibal’s growing erection tightly, lip pulled between his teeth.

Hannibal smiled, and reached down to unzip Will’s jeans slowly, then peeled the dark denim from Will’s pale hips. “Everything?” Hannibal asked as he slithered down Will’s body and began to peel his boyfriend’s boxers off with his teeth.

“You got me to stay home, may as well make it worth it,” Will murmured, watching Hannibal be the worst sort of tease he could imagine. He carded his hands through his hair, tugging on dark blond stands.

Hannibal groaned at the little taunt, and crawled back up Will’s lithe body to lick at his cock. “What might make it worth it?” he asked, in a low voice.

“Mmm,” Will hummed distractedly, rolling his hips up toward Hannibal’s perfect mouth and tongue. Hannibal chuckled, and then dragged his tongue over Will, again, teasing him relentlessly with his mouth before he dragged his lips over Will’s balls, and sucked them, one at a time. “That… that definitely makes it worth it,” Will groaned, tugging on Hannibal’s hair. Hannibal did things to him he didn’t even know existed, but he didn’t want to ask where he learned them either.

Hannibal rolled Will’s balls in his warm mouth as he sucked him, one hand stroking lazily at his rosy, erect cock as he guided Will’s legs over his shoulders, one at a time.

Will let out a soft groan, and toed off his socks over Hannibal’s shoulders, hands resting down in the covers now, still messy from sleeping the night before. “You’re so good at this…”

“I’m improvising,” Hannibal whispered before he dragged his tongue down, to the sensitive, pink skin between Will’s balls and his ass.

Will’s creamy white skin blushed crimson as Hannibal did that, heat collecting at his lower back, toes curling. “Really?” he all but squeaked out.

Hannibal looked up at Will, over his hips, his own face flushed, eyes bright. “Should I stop?”

“Never,” Will moaned, fingers deep in the bedspread now, he shook his head.

Hannibal smirked, and licked the tip of Will’s cock before he bowed his head again, and resumed the slow, meandering path his tongue took over the patch of delicate skin. He moaned against it, softly, and squeezed Will’s cock as he dragged the tip of his tongue around the rim of Will’s entrance.

Will writhed at that, bucking his hips and trying not to move at the same time, every single nerve in his body seemed on fire in that instant. He grasped for Hannibal’s hair with one hand, afraid he might move. Hannibal groaned at the way Will grabbed at his hair, and spread Will’s ass with both hands. Curious, he eased his tongue into Will, hot and wet, his breath wetting Will’s skin.

“Hannibal-” Will started to say, his voice rough now as his hips worked against Hannibal’s tongue, all sensitive nerves firing at once there, rutting and trying to get more of his tongue inside.

Will’s body bucked, beautifully, and Hannibal gripped Will’s hips with both hands, and slid his tongue further inside, with a deep groan that rumbled in his chest. The brunet swore under his breath, and tugged harder on Hannibal’s hair, legs tight over his shoulders as his body started to tense, heat coiling at his lower back.

Hannibal could feel Will’s body quiver, thrilling at the sensation of Hannibal’s tongue plunging into him, over and over. He pushed Will up a little, exposing his ass, and spread him open a little more with every pass of his tongue.

“God-” Will groaned out, bucking and writhing, both trying to get away and trying to get more of Hannibal all at once, in turns. “Please, please…”

Hannibal groaned, a primal sound, deep in his chest, and pulled Will down over his tongue, curling it against the smooth walls of muscle inside Will’s body, taunting the nerves as he slicked Will from the inside out, breathing hard against him.

Wanting to kiss the hell out of Hannibal, but not wanting him to stop either, Will huffed out a groan as he tugged on his boyfriend’s hair, aching for more, of anything, Hannibal had his body already desperately clinging to the edge. Just when Will was about to come, Hannibal pulled his mouth away. Hannibal rose onto his knees, then crawled between Will’s legs, and rubbed his cock against Will’s wet entrance as he watched Will’s face, to see if this was what he wanted.

Will bore down, tangling legs around Hannibal to get him in, no questions asked, slowly feeling himself be filled, suddenly too full all at once, and yet heated with lust and need.

Hannibal pressed himself into Will’s slick entrance with a gasp. His hands trembled against Will’s hips, and clutched at them as their bodies fused together, slowly.

Breathing through it, Will grasped for Hannibal by the hair and brought him down for a sloppy kiss, mostly just panting against his mouth as he was filled completely by his boyfriend. “Hannibal-”

“Will-” Hannibal managed to gasp, and rested their faces together as he rocked his hips. It felt as though electric shocks shot up his spine with every thrust, stunning him.

Will writhed and rolled his hips to meet Hannibal, his cock stuffed so deep inside he thought he might just burst each time it seemed to hit against that sweet spot in the back, turning his body to fire all at once, gasping and groaning as he tried desperately to hold off but pleasure was working over his senses too quickly.

Hannibal had never felt anything so intimate, in every way. It felt like they were melding, physically, psychologically, blurring together as Hannibal filled Will.

“I’m-” the younger of them started to groan out, but within seconds he was coming apart at the seams, hot and streaming across his stomach and chest.

Will’s body squeezed tight around Hannibal’s cock, and made him groan as he began to thrust harder into Will, hips slapping against Will’s ivory ass, marking it pink as Will came.

Hannibal felt himself start to wind tight inside, intense tingling electricity shooting through his nerves as heat pooled against his spine.

“Will-” he heard himself gasp, and then a low, wild keening sound he barely recognized as his own as his vision burned white, and he came, buried deep inside Will.

Grasping Hannibal close when he felt the shuddering and shaking stop, Will kissed his boyfriend through heavy breaths, holding him close over him. He’d wanted  _ that _ with Hannibal since he realized two men could do  _ that _ .

“I love you.”

Hannibal kissed Will back, trembling from head to toe, and over-heated. He felt molten inside, but light, almost like they were floating together. “I love you, too,” Hannibal whispered against Will’s forehead, his hot breath moving Will’s curls.

“So worth staying home for,” Will whispered back, smirking a little as his limbs finally gave out and he stopped hugging Hannibal so tightly to him, spent.   
  
Hannibal smiled against Will’s warm lips, and kissed him again, both of them an utter mess, but radiant with bliss.   
  
“You are worth crossing oceans for,” Hannibal whispered, as he brushed their noses together, and placed one hand over Will’s thundering heart.

“I’m just glad you made it back to me,” Will sighed, his breathing slowly calming down. He’d longed to see Hannibal again since the day they parted.

“So am I,” Hannibal whispered, and rolled to the side with Will, keeping Will in his arms, against his chest as their hearts began to find the same rhythm, like bonded horses walking together. “Returning to you was never something I was going to abandon,” Hannibal murmured, gazing at Will’s features, which seemed more ethereal than ever in the thrall of afterglow.

“Even if I didn’t want you the way you did?” Will asked, curious mostly, gazing up at Hannibal, content here, in Hannibal’s arms.

“Even if you were already in love with another,” Hannibal admitted, and smirked. “I would win you over, of course.”

Will chuckled, and rolled Hannibal over, laying across his chest, looking down at him, curls in his eyes, flushed, content. “Of course you would.”

Hannibal touched Will’s chin, then brushed his fingers over the perfect line of his jaw, fondly. “We are inseparable.”


End file.
